Charles Spurgeon Commentary Matthew 12:3-4

"But he said unto them, Have ye not read what David did, when he was hungry, and they that were with him; how he entered into the house of God, and ate the showbread, which it was not lawful for him to eat, neither for them that were with him, but only for the priests?" — Matthew 12:3-4 (ASV)

He speaks to his learned opponents as if they had not read the law which they professed to uphold. Have you not read? The instance of David served the Son of David well. It was clear from his example that necessity has no law. The Tabernacle law was broken by David when he and his band were pressed with hunger and that breach of law touched Jewish ritual in a very special and tender point, and yet he was never rebuked for it.

To have eaten the holy bread out of profanity, or bravado, or levity might have involved the offender in the judgment of death, but to do so in urgent need was not blameworthy in the case of David. As men excuse any breach of manners necessitated by the pressure of hunger, so does the Lord permit any ceremonial point of law to give way to His mercy and to man’s evident necessity. The law of the Sabbath was never meant to compel hungry men to starvation, any more than the law of “the house of God” and “the shewbread.” Works of necessity are lawful on the Sabbath.