1 Samuel 19:13 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

Michal took an image— In the Hebrew it is תרפים teraphim; which teraphim, it plainly follows from hence, must have been figures of the human form; for the design of Michal was manifestly to deceive the messengers of Saul, by shewing them something in a bed so far resembling a man as to make them believe it was David himself. And as this was plainly her design, one would conceive that the next clause should express something demonstrative of sickness. What wonder is there that she put a pillow under the head? (though, by the way, our translation of a pillow, for a bolster, has no great meaning in it.) I should apprehend the passage might be rendered, and she put a goat's skin to, or over, its head, and covered it with a garment; for thus there would be an appearance of sickness, and the imposition would not be so easily detected. Several interpreters have supposed, that Michal put goat's hair round the head of the image: but the interpretation that we have given seems nearest the Hebrew, and best suited to the circumstances. The Vulgate renders it, et pellem pilosam caprarum posuit ad caput ejus. Abarbanel and Abendana say, that women in those times were accustomed to have figures made in the likeness of their husbands, that when they were absent from them they might have their image to look upon. If this was the case, Michal's image, most probably, was one of this kind.