What Does 2 Samuel 8:17 Mean?

(17) **Ahimelech, the son of Abiathar.**—So Ahimelech is also described in 1Chronicles 18:16; 1Chronicles 24:6; on the other hand, Abiathar is expressly said to be the son of Ahimelech in the narrative in 1Samuel 22:20-23. This difficulty is increased by the further notices of the men bearing these names. Ahimelech was certainly the high priest who gave the shew-bread to David, and was slain in consequence by Saul (1 Samuel 21, 22), and Abiathar, who fled to David, and afterwards became high priest, and was finally put out of the high-priesthood by Solomon (1 Kings 1, 2) was certainly his son; but, on the other hand, in 1Chronicles 24:3; 1Chronicles 24:6; 1Chronicles 24:31 Ahimelech. is said to have been the co-priest with Zadok during the reign of David, and our Lord says that David ate the shew-bread “in the days of Abiathar, the high priest” (Mark 2:26). These apparently conflicting facts have occasioned unnecessary perplexity. The simple solution of the difficulty seems to be that *both *names were borne alike by father and by son, so that both of them are spoken of sometimes under one name, sometimes under the other. On the double high-priesthood of Zadok and Abiathar, see Note at the beginning of 2 Samuel 6.