2 Samuel 21:8 - Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible

Rizpah; Saul's concubine, 2 Samuel 21:11 2 Samuel 3:7. The five sons of Michal, or, of Michal's sister, to wit, Merab; for Michal had no children, 2 Samuel 6:23, nor was she married to this Adriel, but to Phalti, or Phaltiel, the son of Laish, 1 Samuel 25:44 2 Samuel 3:15; and Merab her sister was married to this very Adriel the Meholathite, 1 Samuel 18:19. And it must be remembered, that the Hebrew language is very short, and full of ellipses or defects of words, which yet may be easily understood from the sense. Particularly relative words are oft lacking, and to be supplied; as Goliath is put for Goliath's brother, here, 2 Samuel 21:19, and uncle for uncle's son, Jeremiah 32:7,12. Or, the sons of Merab are called the sons of Michal, to wit, by adoption; or, the near kindred and next heirs of Michal, and brought up by her; for upon that and such-like accounts the title of son is oft given in Scripture, as Genesis 48:5 Exodus 2:10 Deuteronomy 25:5,6 Rth 1:11,12 4:17. Quest. But why then are not these called the sons of Merab ? Answ. Because they were better known by their relation to Michal, who was David's wife, and, it may be, alive at this time, and having no children of her own, took these, and bred them up as her own; when Merab was now a more obscure person, and possibly dead many years before this. Whom she brought up; for so this Hebrew verb, which primarily and properly signifies to bear, is sometimes used, as Genesis 1:23 Ruth 4:17, because the education of children is a kind of bearing of them, as requiring frequently no less care and pains than the bearing doth; whence it is that nurses are reputed as mothers, and sometimes go under that name both in sacred and profane writers. See Ruth 4:16,17; and compare Genesis 16:2, Genesis 30:3 Numbers 11:12 Galatians 4:19. The Meholathite; of Abel-meholah in the tribe of Benjamin, Judges 7:22; so he is here called by way of distinction from Barzillai the Gileadite, 2 Samuel 19:31.