As he was passing through a field of grain on the sabbath, his disciples began to make a path while picking the heads of grain. 24 At this the Pharisees said to him, “Look, why are they doing what is unlawful on the sabbath?” 25 He said to them, “Have you never read what David did when he was in need and he and his companions were hungry? 26 How he went into the house of God when Abiathar was high priest and ate the bread of offering that only the priests could lawfully eat, and shared it with his companions?” 27 Then he said to them, “The sabbath was made for man, not man for the sabbath. 28 That is why the Son of Man is lord even of the sabbath.”
Mark places this scene on the Sabbath as Jesus and his disciples walk through a grainfield. The disciples “began to make a path while picking the heads of grain” (v. 23). The action itself was not theft. Israel’s law allowed a traveler to pluck grain by hand to satisfy immediate hunger (cf. Deut. 23:25). The objection is about timing and interpretation. The Pharisees treat the act of picking as “work” and therefore “unlawful on the sabbath” (v. 24). In other words, they read the disciples’ simple act of taking food while walking as a form of harvesting, which Scripture forbids on the sabbath (cf. Ex. 34:21), within the larger command to rest and keep the day holy (cf. Ex. 20:8-11).
Jesus answers in a way that makes the dispute larger than a technical argument. He does not start by listing regulations. He starts by placing the disciples’ hunger inside Israel’s own Scriptures. He points to David, “in need,” with companions who were hungry (v. 25). David entered “the house of God” and ate “the bread of offering,” which was normally reserved for priests, and he shared it with his men (v. 26). The Old Testament story behind this is David’s flight from Saul and his receiving the holy bread at the sanctuary (cf. 1 Sm 21:1-6). Under normal circumstances, that bread was reserved for the priests, as Israel’s worship law makes clear (cf. Lev 24:5-9). Jesus’ point is not that rules do not matter. His point is that God’s law was never meant to crush the hungry or treat basic human need as a violation of holiness. In the story of David, a sacred regulation yields in the face of real necessity, and the result is not contempt for God but preservation of life.
Mark’s wording in v. 26 says this happened “when Abiathar was high priest,” while 1 Samuel names Ahimelech in that episode (1 Sm 21:1). Some interpreters read Mark’s phrase as a way of locating the story in the period associated with Abiathar, who becomes prominent in David’s story, rather than as a claim about the exact name used at that moment. What matters for Mark’s argument is the shared biblical pattern: a great leader provides for hungry followers in a way that shows how holiness and human life belong together, not in competition.
After that example, Jesus gives two short statements that carry the weight of the passage. First: “The sabbath was made for man, not man for the sabbath” (v. 27). The sabbath is a gift. It is for rest, worship, and the ordering of life toward God. It is not meant to become a heavy burden that treats people as if they exist to serve a rule. This line does not cancel sabbath holiness. It states what sabbath holiness is for. It is meant to serve the good of the person and the life of the covenant community, not to push people into needless hardship.
Second: “That is why the Son of Man is lord even of the sabbath” (v. 28). Mark brings the argument to authority. Jesus is not only explaining the sabbath’s purpose. He is claiming the right to interpret it. Earlier in Mark, Jesus already drew conflict by exercising authority to forgive sins, something that belongs to God (Mk 2:10). Now He claims authority over the sabbath, an institution God himself established in the law. Mark is showing that the controversy is not merely about what counts as work. He is continuing to establish who Jesus is and what authority he bears in Israel.
The title “Son of Man” does important work here. In ordinary speech, it can mean “a human being,” but Israel’s Scriptures also use it in a royal, end-time sense for the figure who receives lasting authority and dominion from God (cf. Dan. 7:13-14). In Mark, Jesus uses “Son of Man” as his own preferred way of speaking about himself. Here, it lets him speak with both humility and grandeur at once. He is present in the scene as a man among men, walking with his disciples. Yet he also speaks as the one who has the right to declare what the sabbath means, because he stands in a unique relation to God’s purpose and God’s law.
Lord Jesus, give us a clear understanding of your word. Teach us to honor what God has made holy, and to see how your authority reveals the true purpose of God’s gifts. Amen.
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Sources and References
- The Holy Bible, New American Bible, Revised Edition (2011).
- Scott Hahn and Curtis Mitch, The Ignatius Catholic Study Bible: The New Testament (Ignatius Press), 70.
- Raymond E. Brown, S.S., Joseph A. Fitzmyer, S.J., and Roland E. Murphy, O. Carm., eds., The New Jerome Biblical Commentary (Prentice Hall, 1990), 603.
- Faculty of Theology of the University of Navarre, The Navarre Bible: New Testament (Four Courts Press/Scepter Publishers, 2008), 170-171.
- José Enrique Aguilar Chiu et al., eds., The Paulist Biblical Commentary (Paulist Press, 2018), 984.
- John J. Collins et al., eds., The Jerome Biblical Commentary for the Twenty-First Century, 3rd fully rev. ed. (T&T Clark, 2020), 1249.
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