Then David went to Nob to Ahimelech the priest; and Ahimelech came trembling [in fear] to meet David and said to him, “Why are you alone, and no one with you?”

David said to Ahimelech the priest, “The king has commissioned me with a matter and has told me, ‘Let no one know anything about the matter for which I am sending you and with which I have commissioned you. I have directed the young men to a certain place.’

David said to Ahimelech, “Do you not have a sword or spear here on hand? For I brought neither my sword nor my [other] weapons with me, because the king’s business was urgent.”

Then Doeg the Edomite, who was standing with Saul’s servants, replied, “I saw the son of Jesse coming to Nob, to Ahimelech [the priest] the son of Ahitub.

Ahimelech inquired of the Lord for him, and gave him provisions and the sword of Goliath the Philistine.”

Then the king sent someone to call Ahimelech the priest, the son of Ahitub, and all his father’s household, the priests who were at Nob; and all of them came to the king.

Then Ahimelech answered the king, “And who among all your servants is as faithful and trustworthy as David, who is the king’s son-in-law, and who is captain over your guard [and your confidant], and is honored in your house?

But Saul said, “Be assured that you shall die, Ahimelech, you and all your father’s household (extended family).”

But one of the sons of Ahimelech the son of Ahitub, named Abiathar, escaped and fled to David.

When Abiathar the son of Ahimelech fled to David at Keilah, he came down with an ephod in his hand.

Then David said to Ahimelech the Hittite and to Abishai the son of Zeruiah, brother of Joab, “Who will go down with me to Saul in the camp?” And Abishai said, “I will go down with you.”

David said to Abiathar the priest, Ahimelech’s son, “Please bring me the ephod.” So Abiathar brought him the ephod.

Zadok the son of Ahitub and Ahimelech the son of Abiathar were the [chief] priests, and Seraiah was the scribe;

David, with Zadok of the sons of Eleazar and Ahimelech of the sons of Ithamar, divided them according to their offices for their assigned duties.

Shemaiah, the son of Nethanel the scribe, from the Levites, recorded them in the presence of the king, the officers, Zadok the priest, Ahimelech the son of Abiathar [the priest who escaped Saul’s massacre at Nob], and the heads of the fathers’ households of the priests and of the Levites; one father’s household taken for Eleazar and one taken for Ithamar.

These also cast lots as did their relatives the sons of Aaron in the presence of David the king, Zadok, Ahimelech, and the heads of the fathers’ households of the priests and of the Levites—the head of father’s households as well as those of his younger brother.