David and Michal Contest Royal Honor

Michal meets him with honor-language that cuts

David returns to bless his household. Michal, daughter of Saul, comes out to meet him: How glorious was the king of Israel today, who uncovered himself today in the eyes of the handmaids of his servants, as one of the vain fellows shamelessly uncovers himself. She frames the dance as royal shame, seen by women of lower household status whose own voices are not heard.

The quarrel is about exposure, honor, household standing, and what a king owes the LORD in public. Michal is Saul's daughter as well as David's wife. Her contempt may hold court dignity, political memory, personal injury from being taken from Paltiel, or several of these. The text gives her speech, not a full inner biography.

David defends abasement, and the scene closes with childlessness unnamed as to cause

David says it was before the LORD, who chose him before her father and before all his house to appoint him ruler over the people of the LORD, over Israel; therefore he will play before the LORD. He will yet be more vile than this, and will be base in his own sight; and of the maidservants she has spoken of, of them he will be had in honor.

Therefore Michal the daughter of Saul had no child unto the day of her death. The notice states a later condition. It does not say the LORD closed her womb, that David refused her, or that infertility is the penalty for criticizing a king. Childlessness is not evidence of divine rejection, moral failure, or weak faith. David's last word in the argument is not made morally final by the narrator.