In any case, while David was in hiding, the king gave Michal as a wife to his ally, Paltiel son of Laish. Whether Saul believed Michal about this is not clear. Finally when Saul learned of her trick, Michal claimed that David had threatened to kill her if she did not help him. When Saul's men attempted to enter the house to capture David, Michal bought more time for him by telling them her husband was ill. She then made up David's bed to appear that he was still sleeping in it. "If you don't run for your life tonight," she informed him, "tomorrow you'll be killed." To escape detection from Saul's spies, she let David down through a window, allowing him to make good his escape. Knowing of her father's intentions, Michal risked her father's wrath to warn David. Saul next sent men to David and Michal's house. In one famous incident, Saul tried to spear him while David was playing his harp. The evil spirit from God again came over Saul, this time causing him to attempt to kill David directly. Michal played a heroic role in the ensuing saga. Having received this grisly present, Saul indeed gave Michal to David in marriage. David, however, returned with not 100, but 200 foreskins of the Philistines he had conquered. The narrator's view is that Saul intended for David to be killed in the resulting battle. Thus, when David again pleaded that he was not wealthy enough to marry a royal daughter, Saul, feigning generosity, informed him that the bride-price for the marriage would involve no money, but would consist of David's bringing Saul 100 Philistine foreskins. His motive for this, however, was not entirely pure, for "an evil spirit from the Lord" sometimes came over the king and moved him such depression and jealousy that he wished to kill David.
Later, Saul learned that Michal was enamored of David and gave him another chance to marry into the royal family. Pleading humility and poverty, David demurred. Nevertheless, Saul offered David the hand of his elder daughter, Merab in marriage. However, his popularity also made Saul suspicious, and the king began to view David as a threat. David soon proved to be a capable soldier and was made one of Saul's military captains. He quickly became Saul's favorite and formed a close alliance with Michal's brother Jonathan as well. Michal's future husband David first appears on the scene when the Israelites and Philistines face each other at the Valley of Elah, where the still adolescent David famously slew the giant Goliath. "All the days of Saul," says the biblical author regarding the period of Michal's childhood and young adulthood, "there was bitter war with the Philistines." (1 Samuel 14:52) Saul also won important victories over the Amalekites, but lost the crucial support of the prophet Samuel for not being thorough enough in destroying them. She grew up during a period of instability in which the 12 tribes of Israel were beginning to form a federation that would eventually become a more or less cohesive nation under her father's leadership.
Michal is introduced in 1 Samuel 14, where she is identified as the daughter of Saul's wife Ahinoam and the younger sister of Saul's first daughter, Merab. She follows the example of numerous biblical women whose willingness to put themselves at risk protected the lives of key providential leaders. In modern times, Michal has served as an example of romantic love, an archetype of feminine heroism, and as evidence for the oppression of women in a patriarchal age. After Michal scolded David for this act, the two became estranged, and she had no children. Later, she took offense at David's near-naked dancing in public as he brought the Ark of the Covenant to Jerusalem. The Bible does not make clear how Michal felt toward David at this point. Many years later, during a civil war with Saul's son Ishbosheth, David caused the northern military chief Abner to bring Michal back to him when Abner wished to switch sides and join David's forces. However, when David was forced to become a fugitive, her father required her to marry another man, Paltiel son of Laish. She loved him at the risk of her own life by helping him escape when Saul sought to kill him. Michal had fallen in love with David when he was still a young commander in King Saul's army and became David's wife after he proved his worth to Saul by killing 200 Philistines. Her story is recorded in the Book of Samuel. Michal (Hebrew: מיכל) was a daughter of King Saul and the first wife of King David in the Hebrew Bible. Michal saves her husband David from her father Saul (Gustave Doré, 1865).
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