Queen Michal Sees Something, Says Something (so why was she censored?)
I Chronicles.15.29
Protest has always been silenced by those in power. It’s happening now, as the media covers selective aspects of resistance to tyranny and supremacy, wars and what’s really behind them.
This has always been the case -- and today’s chapter of Chronicles includes another example of a protest that was literally silenced - the silenced protest of a queen.
Michal, princess of Israel, was the second daughter of King Saul and Queen Ahinoam of Israel. did not have children with David, and so she was not mentioned among his many child rearing wives and concubines - at least 18 of them. But she was his first wife, and even if likely never wore the queen’s crown - was there by his side even as he took over the throne from her father.
But even without heirs to the throne, her story survived her, beyond traditional child rearing roles - for several reasons, and in multiple versions, including today’s chapter in which she’s mentioned in the Bible for the last time.
The author of Chronicles repeats the dramatic scene we last read in II Samuel 6:16, as King David dances ecstatically before the Ark of the Covenant as the sacred object is led to its new home in Jerusalem. Clad in nothing more than a ceremonial girdle, the king is practically naked as he enters the city and the author describes what this view looks like from the palace window:
“As the Ark of God entered the City of David, Michal daughter of Saul looked out of the window and saw King David leaping and dancing before God; and she despised him in her heart.:
When they meet, a few verses later, Michal tells her husband David:
“How the king of Israel honored himself today, uncovering himself... as one of the riffraff might shamelessly uncover himself!”
David fires back, doubling down on his divine authority. And the narrator closes the curtain hard:
“And Michal, daughter of Saul, had no child to the day of her death.”
Fast forward to I Chronicles 15:29. The same scene. The same dance. But here is a look like a dagger, but none of her words:
וַיְהִ֗י אֲרוֹן֙ בְּרִ֣ית יְהֹוָ֔ה בָּ֖א עַד־עִ֣יר דָּוִ֑יד וּמִיכַ֨ל בַּת־שָׁא֜וּל נִשְׁקְפָ֣ה ׀ בְּעַ֣ד הַחַלּ֗וֹן וַתֵּ֨רֶא אֶת־הַמֶּ֤לֶךְ דָּוִיד֙ מְרַקֵּ֣ד וּמְשַׂחֵ֔ק וַתִּ֥בֶז ל֖וֹ בְּלִבָּֽהּ׃
As the Ark of the Covenant of God arrived at the City of David, Michal daughter of Saul looked out of the window and saw King David leaping and dancing, and she despised him for it.
I_Chronicles.15.29
No confrontation. No words. None of her blame and the punishment of barrenness. Michal is reduced here to a silent viewer. The editor of Chronicles has literally erased her words—and, with them, her resistance.
Why?
In his commentary, the medieval Rashi claims that it was to protect David’s honor:
“Because Chronicles is for David's honor, therefore it is not recorded here what Michael said to David as it was recorded in Samuel.”
There may be more than his wounded honor here - it’s the erasure of what her harsh words represent.
As the daughter of the northern tribes and the regime that was replaced by David, Michal is not just an angry royal wife protesting her husband’s lewd public behavior: She may be the last voice of the resistance to David - silenced by Chronicles that always takes David’s side. She may be against this centralization move, declaring Jerusalem the center and de-centering the north, where other sacred sites and sanctuaries continued to exist.
In her book Fragmented Women, Dr. J. Cheryl Exum calls Michal’s rebuke one of the few moments where a woman in the Hebrew Bible confronts royal male authority:
“Michal’s criticism raises one of the few voices of resistance on the part of Saul’s house to David’s assumption of royal prerogative.”
That’s why her powerful words are mentioned in Samuel - but why they are erased in Chronicles.
Michal is silenced not only as a woman, but as the last living protest from the house of Saul. Her window becomes a stage for a gaze that dares to challenge the king—and for that, she is punished in the text, and edited out in the rewrite.
Protest matters, even if kings and tyrants prefer them silenced, and if authors leave them out of history. Blame her for being an angry bitter woman and erase her political protest?- a familiar populist move.
Today, we listen to Michael, princess and queen of Israel, who had the courage to speak up, even at a price.
Let’s remember Michal today, honoring the courage to speak truth to power. Let’s keep her voice in the room, in the scroll, in the soul. Not bitter. Just brave.
Image: David tanzt vor der heiligen Arche (Bundeslade), Francesco Salviati, 1552-1554.
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