And the Pharisees were saying to him, “Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?”
Mark 2:24. Why do they on the Sabbath what is not lawful? The Pharisees do not blame the disciples of Christ for plucking ears of corn from a field that was not their own, but for violating the Sabbath; as if there had been a precept to this effect, that famishing men ought rather to die than to satisfy their hunger.
Christ had been put to justify himself in conversing with publicans and sinners: here he is put to justify his disciples; and in what they do according to his will he will justify them, and bear them out. I. He justifies them in their not fasting, which was turned to their reproach by the Pharisees. Why do the Pharisees and the disciples of John fast?
Commenting on Mark 2:18-28
And he said unto them,.... By way of answer to their question, and which was a full one, and enough to silence them: have ye never read what David did; referring to the history in Sa1 21:1. when he had need: of bread, was in great necessity, and in the utmost distress: and was an hungered, he, and they that were with him?