Irenaeus of Lyons · a new plain-English translation from the original language
That the Lord's disciples were not acting against the Law when they plucked ears of grain on the Sabbath, since all the Lord's disciples were, as it were, Levites. The Law never barred those who felt hunger from taking food on the Sabbath out of what was near at hand; but it did forbid reaping and gathering into a barn. And so the Lord, to those who accused his disciples because they were plucking ears of grain and eating them, said: Have you not read this, that when David was hungry, how he entered God's house, ate the bread of the presence, and shared it with his companions, though it was permitted to none but the priests alone to eat it? — defending his disciples through the Law's own wording, and showing that it was lawful for priests to act freely. Now David was known to be, in God's sight, a priest, even though Saul persecuted him. For all the righteous hold a priestly rank. And all the Lord's apostles are priests, as, in the blessing of Levi, it is said: He who says to his father and mother, I do not know you, and did not acknowledge his brothers, and disowned his own sons — he kept your precepts and observed your covenant. Now who are they who have left father and mother and renounced all their kin, for the sake of God's word and his covenant, but the Lord's disciples? Of whom Moses states once more: They shall possess no inheritance; the Lord alone stands as their inheritance. And again: Throughout the whole tribe, the Levitical priests shall hold no portion nor possession alongside Israel; they shall live on the fruit-offerings belonging to the Lord, which is their possession. For this reason Paul also says: I do not seek the gift, but I seek the fruit. Since, he means, the Lord's disciples held a Levitical inheritance, it was permitted them, being hungry, to take food from standing grain. For the workman deserves his food. And the priests within the temple desecrated the Sabbath, yet incurred no guilt. Why then were they not guilty? Because, being in the temple, they were carrying out not worldly but the Lord's own services, fulfilling the Law and not transgressing it.