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But judgment shall return unto righteousness - If we read יושב yosheb, shalt sit, for ישוב yashub, shall return, which is only placing the ו vau before the ש shin instead of after it, we have the following sense: Until the just one shall sit in judgment, and after him all the upright in heart. Cyrus has the epithet צדק tsedek, the just one, in different places in the Prophet Isaiah. See Isaiah 41:2, Isaiah 41:10; Isaiah 45:8; Isaiah 51:5. It was Cyrus who gave liberty to the Jews, who appeared as their deliverer and conductor to their own land, and they are all represented as following in his train.
But judgment shall return unto righteousness - That is, The exercise of judgment shall be so manifest to the world - as if it “returned” to it - as to show that there is a righteous God. The truth here taught is, that the “results” of God‘s interposition in human affairs will be such as to show that he is on the side of righteousness, or such as to vindicate and maintain the cause of righteousness in the earth.
And all the upright in heart shall follow it - Margin, shall be after it. The meaning is, that all who are upright in heart - all who are truly righteous - will follow on in the path of justice; that they will regard what God does as right, and will walk in that path. The fact that what occurs is done by God, will be to them a sufficient revelation of what ought to be done; and they will follow out the teachings properly suggested by the divine dealings as their rules of life. In other words, the manifested laws of the divine administration will be to them an indication of what is right; and they will embrace and follow the lessons thus made known to them by the dealings of Divine Providence as the rules of their own conduct.
The judgments visited upon Israel for their sin at Shittim, destroyed the survivors of that vast company, who, nearly forty years before, had incurred the sentence, “They shall surely die in the wilderness.” The numbering of the people by divine direction, during their encampment on the plains of Jordan, showed that “of them whom Moses and Aaron the priest numbered, when they numbered the children of Israel in the wilderness of Sinai, ... there was not left a man of them, save Caleb the son of Jephunneh, and Joshua the son of Nun.” Numbers 26:64, 65. PP 456.1
God had sent judgments upon Israel for yielding to the enticements of the Midianites; but the tempters were not to escape the wrath of divine justice. The Amalekites, who had attacked Israel at Rephidim, falling upon those who were faint and weary behind the host, were not punished till long after; but the Midianites who seduced them into sin were speedily made to feel God's judgments, as being the more dangerous enemies. “Avenge the children of Israel of the Midianites” (Numbers 31:2), was the command of God to Moses; “afterward shalt thou be gathered unto thy people.” This mandate was immediately obeyed. One thousand men were chosen from each of the tribes and sent out under the leadership of Phinehas. “And they warred against the Midianites, as the Lord commanded Moses.... And they slew the kings of Midian, beside the rest of them that were slain; ... five kings of Midian: Balaam also the son of Beor they slew with the sword.” Verses 7, 8. The women also, who had been made captives by the attacking army, were put to death at the command of Moses, as the most guilty and most dangerous of the foes of Israel. PP 456.2
Such was the end of them that devised mischief against God's people. Says the psalmist: “The heathen are sunk down in the pit that they made: in the net which they hid is their own foot taken.” Psalm 9:15. “For the Lord will not cast off His people, neither will He forsake His inheritance. But judgment shall return unto righteousness.” When men “gather themselves together against the soul of the righteous,” the Lord “shall bring upon them their own iniquity, and shall cut them off in their own wickedness.” Psalm 94:14, 15, 21, 23. PP 456.3
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