Part of the four things the earth cannot bear, Proverbs 30:21–23.
Quick answer
The first two of four. Someone with no preparation holding power, and someone with no judgment holding plenty. Neither is a complaint about where they came from.
Read the whole unit
Four reversals in which someone receives what they have no capacity to carry, or a household is rebuilt around a wound.
Read the whole unit
Four situations that make the ground shake, and this is the unit in the chapter most easily turned into something ugly. Read carelessly it sounds like a complaint about people rising above their station: a slave on a throne, a servant girl in her mistress's place. The book itself blocks that reading, and it does so plainly. 17:2 says a wise servant will rule over a son who causes shame and share the inheritance among the brothers, and it says it with approval. Proverbs is not against a servant rising. It has already said a good one should.
So the four are not about rank. Each names a reversal in which someone receives what they have no capacity to carry, or a household is restructured around a wound. The fool at verse 22 makes that clear, since being filled with food is not a promotion. And the fool is the second occurrence of a verb that has now run through this chapter four times, שָׂבַע, to be full: Agur prayed at verse 9 not to be full and deny God, verses 15 and 16 listed what is never full, and here a fool is.
⚠ The unit's guard, which belongs on every member page: this saying does not license contempt for anyone's origins, and it has never been safe in the hands of people who benefit from other people staying put. A proverb describing the strain of a badly handled reversal cannot be turned into a reason to prevent one. The book that wrote this also wrote 17:2 and 22:2, where the rich and the poor meet together and the LORD is the maker of them all.
What this verse contributes
The two clearest cases, and the second one interprets the first. Being filled with food is not a promotion, so whatever is wrong here cannot be about rank. What the fool and the newly reigning servant share is a gap between what they now have and what they were formed to handle.
And the book has already refused the class reading outright. 17:2 says a wise servant will rule over a son who causes shame and will share the inheritance among the brothers. The adjective is the whole difference. Proverbs will hand a servant a throne without hesitation when he is wise. 19:10 makes the same distinction from the other side, saying luxury is not fitting for a fool before it says anything about servants and princes.
Notice also what the fool is full of. שָׂבַע is the verb Agur used in his own prayer at verse 9, asking not to be full and deny God. He prayed to be spared exactly the condition this verse says the earth cannot bear, which suggests he did not think himself exempt from it.
Related: Proverbs 17:2 · Proverbs 19:10 · Proverbs 30:9 · Proverbs 29:21
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.