Then the king sent to call for Achimelech the priest the son of Achitob, and all his father's house, the priests that were in Nobe, and they came all of them to the king.

And the king sendeth to call Ahimelech son of Ahitub, the priest, and all the house of his father, the priests, who are in Nob, and they come all of them unto the king;

Then the king sent for Ahimelech the priest, the son of Ahitub, and for all the men of his father's family who were priests in Nob: and they all came to the king.

Then the king sent to summon Ahimelech, the priest, the son of Ahitub, and all of his father's house, the priests who were in Nob, and they all came before the king.

Then the king sent to call Ahimelech the priest, the son of Ahitub, and all his father's house, (h) the priests that [were] in Nob: and they came all of them to the king.
(h) Which were the remnant of the house of Eli, whose house God threatened to punish.

Then the king sent to call Ahimelech the priest, the son of Ahitub,.... Sent messengers to him, and summoned him to appear before him:
and all his father's house; the family of Eli, which God had threatened to destroy, and now the time was hastening on:
the priests that were in Nob; in which dwelt none but priests, at least these were the chief of the inhabitants, and therefore called the city of the priests, 1-Samuel 22:19,
and they came all of them to the king; not being conscious of any evil they had committed, or that could be charged upon them; or otherwise they would not have appeared, but would have fled to David for protection.

On receiving this information, Saul immediately summoned the priest Ahimelech and "all his father's house," i.e., the whole priesthood, to Nob, to answer for what they had done. To Saul's appeal, "Why have ye conspired against me, thou and the son of Jesse, by giving him bread?" Ahimelech, who was not conscious of any such crime, since David had come to him with a false pretext, and the priest had probably but very little knowledge of what took place at court, replied both calmly and worthily (1-Samuel 22:14): "And who of all thy servants is so faithful (proved, attested, as in Numbers 12:7) as David, and son-in-law of the king, and having access to thy private audience, and honoured in thy house?" The true explanation of אל־משׁמעתּך סר may be gathered from a comparison of 2-Samuel 23:23 and 1-Chronicles 11:25, where משׁמעת occurs again, as the context clearly shows, in the sense of a privy councillor of the king, who hears his personal revelations and converses with him about them, so that it corresponds to our "audience." סוּר, lit. to turn aside from the way, to go in to any one, or to look after anything (Exodus 3:3; Ruth 4:1, etc.); hence in the passage before us "to have access," to be attached to a person. This is the explanation given by Gesenius and most of the modern expositors, whereas the early translators entirely misunderstood the passage, though they have given the meaning correctly enough at 2-Samuel 23:23. But if this was the relation in which David stood to Saul, - and he had really done so for a long time, - there was nothing wrong in what the high priest had done for him; but he had acted according to the best of his knowledge, and quite conscientiously as a faithful subject of the king. Ahimelech then added still further (1-Samuel 22:15): "Did I then begin to inquire of God for him this day?" i.e., was it the first time that I had obtained the decision of God for David concerning important enterprises, which he had to carry out in the service of the king? "Far be from me," sc., any conspiracy against the king, like that of which I am accused. "Let not the king lay it as a burden upon thy servant, my whole father's house (the omission of the cop. ו before בּכל־כּית may be accounted for from the excitement of the speaker); for thy servant knows not the least of all this." בּכל־זאת, of all that Saul had charged him with.

The priests - Of the house of Eli, which God had threatened to cut off, 1-Samuel 2:31.