1 Samuel 8:13

13 The king will take your daughters from you and force them to cook and bake and make perfumes for him.

1 Samuel 8:13 Meaning and Commentary

1 Samuel 8:13

And he will take your daughters to be confectionaries
Such as deal in spices, and mix them, and make them up in various forms very agreeable to the taste. Men are commonly in our countries and times employed in such arts, but it seems this was the business of women in those times and places. Some versions ^F4 render it "unguentariae", makers or sellers of ointments, and such there were in some nations ^F5, such was Lydia in Juvenal ^F6;

and to be cooks;
to dress all sorts of food, especially what were boiled, as the word signifies: and to be bakers; to make and bake bread, which though with us is the work of men, yet in the eastern countries was usually done by women; (See Gill on Leviticus 26:26).

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FOOTNOTES:

F4 So V. L. and Tigurine.
F5 Vid. Plin. Nat. Hist. l. 8. c. 5.
F6 Satyr. 2. ver. 141. Vid. Turnebi Adversar. l. 15. c. 17.

1 Samuel 8:13 In-Context

11 “This is how a king will reign over you,” Samuel said. “The king will draft your sons and assign them to his chariots and his charioteers, making them run before his chariots.

12 Some will be generals and captains in his army, some will be forced to plow in his fields and harvest his crops, and some will make his weapons and chariot equipment.

13 The king will take your daughters from you and force them to cook and bake and make perfumes for him.

14 He will take away the best of your fields and vineyards and olive groves and give them to his own officials.

15 He will take a tenth of your grain and your grape harvest and distribute it among his officers and attendants.