1 Samuel 18:17-21

New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition

David Marries Michal

¹⁷ Then Saul said to David, “Here is my elder daughter Merab; I will give her to you as a wife; only be valiant for me and fight the Lord’s battles.” For Saul thought, “I will not raise a hand against him; let the Philistines deal with him.” ¹⁸ David said to Saul, “Who am I and who are my kinsfolk, my father’s family in Israel, that I should be son-in-law to the king?” ¹⁹ But at the time when Saul’s daughter Merab should have been given to David, she was given to Adriel the Meholathite as a wife.

²⁰ Now Saul’s daughter Michal loved David. Saul was told, and the thing pleased him. ²¹ Saul thought, “Let me give her to him that she may be a snare for him and that the hand of the Philistines may be against him.” Therefore Saul said to David a second time,^[a] “You shall now be my son-in-law.”