1 Samuel 19:17

17 Saul asked Michal, "Why have you tricked me like this and let my enemy escape?" She answered, "He said he would kill me if I didn't help him escape."

1 Samuel 19:17 Meaning and Commentary

1 Samuel 19:17

And Saul said unto Michal
After the messengers returned and reported what they had seen, when Saul either came to her at her house, or sent for her to his palace:

why hast thou deceived me so;
for deceiving his messengers was deceiving him, by pretending David was sick and in bed, when she had placed an image there, and had let him down through a window, and he was gone:

and sent away mine enemy, that he is escaped?
as if she was more obliged to gratify the wicked passion of a father, than to provide for the safety of her husband:

and Michal answered Saul, he said unto me, let me go, why should I kill
thee?
though she was concerned for the preservation of her husband, yet not for his honour and credit, nor for her own veracity; she attempted not to vindicate her husband from the charge of being an enemy to Saul, as she might; but suggested that he was so desperate a man, that if she had offered to have detained him, he would have murdered her, and threatened, if she did, he would do when both were false; that he should say to her let me go, when it was she that advised him to go, and that if she refused he would kill her; which lies were framed by her to excuse herself, at the expense of her husband's reputation.

1 Samuel 19:17 In-Context

15 But Saul sent them back to see David for themselves. He ordered them, "Carry him here in his bed, and I will kill him."
16 They went inside and found the household idol in the bed and the goats' hair pillow at its head.
17 Saul asked Michal, "Why have you tricked me like this and let my enemy escape?" She answered, "He said he would kill me if I didn't help him escape."
18 David escaped and went to Samuel in Ramah and told him everything that Saul had done to him. Then he and Samuel went to Naioth and stayed there.
19 Saul was told that David was in Naioth in Ramah,
Scripture taken from the Good News Translation - Second Edition, Copyright 1992 by American Bible Society. Used by Permission.