2 Samuel 3:5

Eglah David's wife A Jewish tradition as old as the time of Jerome (Quaest. Hebr. in libros Regum) makes Eglah (heifer, cp. Judges 14:18) another name for Michal, who is supposed to be particularly distinguished both here and in 1 Chronicles 3:3 as David's wife, because she was his first and best-loved. If so, her position last in the list may be accounted for because she was separated from David for a time, and only returned to him towards the close of his residence in Hebron (2 Samuel 3:13), so that Ithream was the youngest of his sons born there.

Polygamy was tolerated by the Mosaic legislation as an existing custom, but discouraged as contrary to the original institution and true ideal of marriage (Deuteronomy 21:15-17; Deuteronomy 17:17; Genesis 2:24, of which perhaps Genesis 31:50 is a corrupt reminiscence). David's family history is a standing monument of the pernicious effects of this practice, which are perpetuated to this day in Oriental countries, where "contentions, envyings, jealousies and quarrels among the wives, as well as between the different sets of children" still prevail. See Van Lennep's Bible Lands, II. p. 559.