1 Samuel 21:5

From women. As far as our information goes there was nothing in the Mosaic regulations forbidding the eating of the bread by those who were ceremonially clean. Some have observed that it was the custom in ancient nations even for heathen priests to keep themselves from women before performing their official duties, and it is quite likely that the Levites observed this custom also. According to Mosaic law, such intercourse rendered a person ceremonially unclean till evening (Leviticus 15:16-18; see also Exodus 19:15). Probably because of the urgency of the king’s business, and because David was the son-in-law and apparently the agent of the king, Ahimelech winked at the letter of the law on the basis that David and his men were ceremonially pure.

The shewbread, literally “bread of the Presence,” typified Christ, the living Bread (John 6:28-51). All of man’s food, both spiritual and temporal, is received only through the mediation of Christ. Both the manna and the shewbread witnessed the fact that “man doth not live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord doth man live” (Deuteronomy 8:3). From the viewpoint of physical food, five loaves meant little to David and his men. But if Ahimelech “enquired of the Lord,” as well as supplying “victuals,” as Doeg testified (1 Samuel 22:10), the visit to the priest was of added value. Perhaps, too, if David thought of the significance of the bread he had secured, it helped him to realize anew the truth that God’s presence would go with him wherever he went. David would need such assurance in the trying years ahead.