Do not be one of those who shakes hands in a pledge,One of those who is surety for debts;
If you have nothing with which to pay,Why should he take away your bed from under you?
Proverbs 22:26–27 · NKJVPart of Do Not Become Surety, Proverbs 22:26–27.
Quick answer
Do not make a habit of guaranteeing other people's debts. The handshake, literally "striking hands," the era's signature on a guaranty, obligates you for money you never borrowed.
Read the whole unit
Read the whole unit
The collection's third saying returns to a warning this book has issued since chapter 6: surety, becoming legally liable for another man's debt. The image in v. 26 is the ceremony itself, striking hands, the public gesture that closed a guaranty, and the phrase "one of those" suggests a type: the habitual co-signer, generous, confident, and exposed. Verse 27 does what the sages do best, converting the abstraction into furniture: fail to pay, and the creditor takes the bed from under you, the last item of a stripped house, seized while you watch. The question form ("why should he...?") invites the son to answer it himself, before the handshake instead of after. The warning is not against generosity; this book commands open hands to the poor in this very chapter (22:9). Give what you can afford to lose. Surety is different: it stakes what you cannot afford, on choices you do not control, and 6:1–5 counsels the trapped guarantor to free himself with the urgency of a gazelle from a hunter.
What this verse contributes
the command and the ceremony: the handshake that signs your name to someone else's risk.
The other half
The saying's ending is a question with a bed in it: if the debt comes due and you cannot pay, why should the creditor carry off the bed from under you? Guaranteed debt reaches your bedroom.
Related: Proverbs 6:1–5 · Proverbs 11:15 · Proverbs 17:18
New King James Version®, Copyright © 1982, Thomas Nelson. All rights reserved. Full copyright information. Scripture provided by API.Bible.
Go Deeper
If this verse has been used to put weight on you that it was never carrying, ask about it directly.