Leviticus 24:5

Twelve cakes. Specific instructions are now given for the preparation and use of the shewbread, mentioned three times previously (Ex. 25:30; 35:13; 39:36). Each cake was made of 4 qt. (4.41 l.) of fine flour. Nothing is said as to whether or not the bread was to be leavened, but the fact that it was placed before the Lord in the first apartment would seem to imply that leaven was not used. Being, as it were, a continuous “meat offering” (Num. 4:7), it would come under the regulations for meat offerings, and must therefore have been made without leaven (Lev. 2:4, 11). Josephus specifically states that leaven was not used (Antiquities iii 6.6). In later times the preparation and arrangement of the cakes were considered the work of the Levites (1 Chron. 9:32).