The priest replied to David, “I don’t have any ordinary bread at my disposal. Only holy bread is available, and then only if your soldiers ¹  have abstained from sexual relations with women.” ² 

David said to Ahimelech, “Is there no sword or spear here at your disposal? I don’t have my own sword or equipment in hand due to the urgency of the king’s instructions.”

So David left there and escaped to the cave of Adullam. When his brothers and the rest of his father’s family ¹  learned about it, they went down there to him.

Then David went from there to Mizpah in Moab, where he said to the king of Moab, “Please let my father and mother stay ¹  with you until I know what God is going to do for me.”

Ahimelech replied to the king, “Who among all your servants is faithful like David? He is the king’s son-in-law, the leader of your bodyguard, and honored in your house!

Then David said to Abiathar, “I knew that day when Doeg the Edomite was there that he would certainly tell Saul! I am guilty ¹  of all the deaths in your father’s house!

But David’s men said to him, “We are afraid while we are still here in Judah! What will it be like if we go to Keilah against the armies of the Philistines?”

When Saul was told that David had come to Keilah, Saul said, “God has delivered ¹  him into my hand, for he has boxed himself into a corner by entering a city with two barred gates.” ² 

Then the Ziphites went up to Saul at Gibeah and said, “Isn’t David hiding among us in the strongholds at Horesh on the hill of Hakilah, south of Jeshimon?

So they left and went to Ziph ahead of Saul. Now David and his men were in the desert of Maon, in the Arabah to the south of Jeshimon.

He came to the sheepfolds by the road, where there was a cave. Saul went into it to relieve himself. ¹  Now David and his men were sitting in the recesses of the cave.

Ask your own servants; they can tell you! May my servants find favor in your sight, for we have come ¹  at the time of a holiday. Please provide us – your servants ²  and your son David – with whatever you can spare.” ³ 

Now David had been thinking, ¹  “In vain I guarded everything that belonged to this man in the desert. I didn’t take anything from him. But he has repaid my good with evil.

Then David took from her hand what she had brought to him. He said to her, “Go back ¹  to your home in peace. Be assured that I have listened to you ²  and responded favorably.” ³ 

Saul camped by the road on the hill of Hakilah near Jeshimon, but David was staying in the desert. When he realized that Saul had come to the desert to find ¹  him,

David said to Ahimelech the Hittite and Abishai son of Zeruiah, Joab’s brother, “Who will go down with me to Saul in the camp?” Abishai replied, “I will go down with you.”

So David and Abishai approached the army at night and found Saul lying asleep in the entrenchment with his spear stuck in the ground by his head. Abner and the army were lying all around him.

Abishai said to David, “Today God has delivered your enemy into your hands. Now let me drive the spear ¹  right through him into the ground with one swift jab! ²  A second jab won’t be necessary!”

David went on to say, “As the Lord lives, the Lord himself will strike him down. Either his day will come and he will die, or he will go down into battle and be swept away.

David called to the army and to Abner son of Ner, “Won’t you answer, Abner?” Abner replied, “Who are you, that you have called to the king?”