Jesus, Abiathar, & the Showbread
The text of Mark 2.26 has caused quite a few folk quite a few problems. Jesus seems to have thought David took the showbread from the sanctuary when Abiathar was the high priest, but the text of Samuel suggests he did it on Ahimelech’s watch. What’s gone wrong here?
Well, first of all, we need to consider a couple of relevant historical questions.
Question #1: Did Abiathar ever hold the office of high priest?
Answer: In a word, ‘Yes’, but it’s hard to say one way or another because the term ‘high priest’ is a bit anachronistic. When the Bible’s legal material refers to the high priesthood as an abstract office, it’s perfectly happy to use the term ‘high priest’ (Lev. 21, Num. 35, Josh. 20), but the Biblical narrative doesn’t refer to a concrete individual as a ‘high priest’ until we get the reign of Jehoash in II Kings 12. As a result, it’s hard to say if a given person was a high priest prior to the reign of Jehoash. We can, however, make a few general comments about the matter.
First, if anyone prior to Jehoash’s day can be said to have been a high priest, then Zadok can (cp. I Chr. 6.8).
Second, Abiathar and Zadok are said to perform the same basic roles (II Sam. 8.17, 15.24ff., I Chr. 15.11) and are referred to by means of the same title (II Sam. 15.35, I Kgs. 1.7–8, 4.4).
And, third, like the authors of Samuel and Kings, Luke is perfectly happy with the notion of a jointly-held high priesthood (Luke 3.2).
In sum, then, Abiathar can legitimately be referred to as a high priest.
Question #2: Did Jesus think Abiathar was the high priest when David took the showbread?
Answer: Not necessarily. The Greek phrase epi Abiathar (‘at the time of Abiathar’?) can be understood in different ways.
The Message over-translates it (epi Abiathar = ‘with the Chief Priest Abiathar right there’). Wycliffe’s Bible goes the other way (‘under Abiathar’). Darby prefers ‘in the section of Abiathar the high priest’. And the ESV footnotes a similar idea to Darby, viz. ‘in the passage about Abiathar’, which is consistent with its treatment of the same construction in Mark 12.26.
To sum up, then, Jesus didn’t necessarily think Abiathar was the high priest when David took the showbread from the sanctuary.
Question #3: Why?
We thus come to the most important question, namely, Why would Jesus want to bring Abiathar into the issue anyway? Why not simply refer to the priest who actually gave David the showbread, namely Ahimelech? The answer requires us to consider some of the particularities of Abiathar’s life and times.
Abiathar occupied a liminal position in Israel’s priestly history. He stood at the cusp of the fall of one priestly line and the rise of another. Consider his situation.
Abiathar was the great-great-grandson of Eli. (Eli fathered Phinehas, who fathered Ahitub, who fathered Ahimelech, who fathered Abiathar: I Sam. 14.3, 22.9ff., 22.20, 23.6, 30.7.) That meant judgment hung over his head. God had said he would wrest the priesthood from Eli’s fallen line and give it to more worthy keepers. Eli’s house would thus be left to look on with envy as others enjoyed God’s favour (I Sam. 2.27ff.). Only one man would be spared. And the reason why he would be spared would be to weep and lament the fall of his house (I Sam. 2.33).
Over the next few decades, God’s words were filled up. Hophni and Phinehas were slain in battle. Phinehas’s son Ahitub died at an early age. (Where we’d expect to find a reference to him we instead find a reference to his son.) Phinehas’s grandson Ahimelech (aka Ahijah) entered the service of a highly unstable Saul. And Saul promptly slew the aforementioned Ahimelech1 along with his kinsmen (I Sam. 22). Only one man escaped (Ahimelech’s son Abiathar), who joined the ranks of David and his outcasts as they fled from Saul (I Sam. 22.2, 20, I Kgs. 2.26).
God thus punished Eli’s sin up to and inclusive of Eli’s fourth generation (Exod. 20.5), which left only Abiathar from Eli’s line to serve at the altar (I Sam. 2.33). Meanwhile, David had appointed Zadok as Israel’s high priest. And so, in David’s day, Abiathar and Zadok jointly held the priesthood (II Sam. 8.17, 15.24, 35). (Abiathar’s son went on to minister under Zadok’s authority: II Sam. 15.27, 36.)
In light of these events, it’s not hard to see why Jesus might have wanted to mention Abiathar in Mark 2. Like Abiathar, Jesus’ disciples stood at a crossroads in history. They’d been born into a fallen order—a nation on its last legs, complete with an unsanctioned king and a corrupt priesthood (Matt. 3.10ff.). And yet, in their day and age, God had raised up a David-like Messiah whose deeds had won the hearts of the people, and whom Israel’s Saul-like authorities (consequently) envied and despised. As such, the disciples’ call was to follow the lead of Abiathar—to separate themselves from a cursed line and instead align themselves with God’s Messiah. Indeed, that is what the text of Mark 2 is all about. The Israel of Jesus’ day was an old wineskin. A new covenantal order was needed for God’s new wine (Mark 2.21–22), and God had raised up a greater David to inaugurate it. Hence, just as the needs of David’s mission took precedence over the usual sanctuary regulations (Mark 2.23–26), so the needs of Jesus’ mission took precedence over the traditions of the Pharisees.
Needless to say, the disciples’ decision to follow God’s Messiah would cost them. For Abiathar, life with David meant a life on the run, persecution at the hands of ‘the establishment’, and a share in David’s afflictions (I Kgs. 2.26). And, for the disciples, the situation was little different. Those who hated Jesus (e.g., Saul’s NT namesake) would hate them with equal fervour. The disciples would be given a cross to bear, no place to lay their heads, and a share in their Lord’s afflictions. And yet the path they would tread would end in unimaginable glory.
The two names borne by Ahijah-aka-Ahimelech reflect the predicament he and his kinsmen faced. Would they be loyal to the melech (Saul) or to Jah (God)?