Online Resource Library
Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Proverbs 22:26 - 22:26
(Show All Books | Show All Chapters)
This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
A third distich follows:
26 Be not among those who strike hands,
Among those who become surety for loans.
27 If thou hast nothing to pay,
Why shall he take away thy bed from under thee?
To strike hands is equivalent to, to be responsible to any one for another, to stake one's goods and honour for him, Pro 6:1; Pro 11:15; Pro 17:18 - in a word, ערב, seq. acc., to pledge oneself for him (Gen 43:9), or for the loan received by him, מַשָּׁאָה, Deu 24:10 (from הִשָּׁה, with ב, of the person and accus. of the thing: to lend something to one on interest). The proverb warns against being one of such sureties (write בָּערבים with Cod. 1294, and old impressions such as the Venice, 1521), against acting as they do; for why wouldest thou come to this, that when thou cast not pay (שִׁלֵּם, to render a full equivalent reckoning, and, generally, to pay, Pro 6:31),
(Note: After Ben-Asher, the pointing is אִם־אֵין־לךָ; while, on the contrary, Ben-Naphtali prefers אִם־אֵין לְךָ; vid., my Genesis (1869), pp. 74 (under Gen 1:3) and 81. So, without any bearing on the sense, Ben-Asher points לָמָּה with Tarcha, Ben-Naphtali with Mercha.)
he (the creditor) take away thy bed from under thee? - for, as Pro 20:16 says, thus improvident suretyships are wont to be punished.