You are strongly recommended to add to your library the excellent revised edition of Harper's Bible Dictionary titled, The Harper Collins Bible Dictionary, Revised Edition [book review], edited by Paul J. Achtemeier, with the Society of Biblical Literature (NY: Harper Collins, 1996). It is currently the best one-volume Bible dictionary in English, and it is available at Border's Books, Christian Science Reading Rooms, http://www.borders.com, or http://www.christianbook.com.

Mephibosheth, an intentionally distorted form of the original name Mippi-baal (Heb., ‘out of the mouth of Baal’). Baal, which means ‘lord,’ was earlier used as a simple epithet for God, but because the epithet was also used for a major Canaanite deity, later scribes often replaced this element in proper names with the word bosheth, ‘shame.’

Two men in the Bible bear this name. 1 A son of Saul whom David handed over to the Gibeonites for execution (2 Sam. 21:8-9). 2 Jonathan’s son, the grandson of Saul, whom David spared because of his covenant with Jonathan (2 Sam. 4:4; 21:7). The names of the two individuals appear to have been confused, however, since according to 1 Chronicles, the real name of Jonathan’s son was Meribbaal (8:34; 9:40).

David treated Mephibosheth with kindness (2 Sam. 9:6-13), but Mephibosheth’s apparent disloyalty during Absalom’s revolt angered David (2 Sam. 16:1-4). Only partly appeased by Mephibosheth’s explanation, David divided Saul’s property between Mephibosheth and his servant Ziba (2 Sam. 19:24-30).

Mephibosheth. On hearing the news of the death of Jonathan (Mephibosheth's father) and Saul (his grandfather), his nurse dropped the infant Mephibosheth in her haste (2 Sam. 4:4), after which he was permanently lame. David treated him generously, even when he was implicated in the plot of Absalom to seize the throne (2 Sam. 16:1-4). It is likely that Meribbaal (1Chron. 8:34) is another name for the same person; 'bosheth', meaning 'shame', was substituted for the objectionable word 'baal'.