Unlike Abraham and Elisha, who take the initiative to mislead, or Moses and Samuel who mislead a king, God instructs Jeremiah to deceive the officials on the orders of Zedekiah, king of Judah. Jeremiah tells Zedekiah that he must surrender to the Babylonians if he wants to save himself and Judah. However, Zedekiah advises the prophet that if he is interrogated about the content of their conversation, Jeremiah should tell them, “I was presenting my petition to the king not to send me back to the house of Jonathan to die there” (Jer. 38:24–26). And Jeremiah does do “just as the king had instructed him” (v. 27).
In the view of scholars who believe Jeremiah 38:14–28 is a parallel tradition to Jeremiah 37:17–21,47, Jeremiah was telling the truth because he did entreat the king not to send him back to the house of the scribe Jonathan (37:20). As to those scholars who suggest some kind of textual error and believe 38:14b–27 is an immediate chronological sequel to 37:17–20 and continuing the king’s conversation with the prophet, Jeremiah did not tell a lie. He only concealed the political portion of the encounter. However, even if we accept the biblical text as it is, consider chapter 38 to be the chronological sequel to ch. 37, recounting an event other than that described in chapters 37 and 50 Jeremiah is not telling an outright lie: he is simply telling the officials what he said to the king in a previous meeting. It appears that the prophet was deceptive and intended to be deceitful by using a technique of telling half-truths or by being ambiguous. He intended to deceive and mislead another person but his motives were not centered around himself but accepts the presence of the enemy in war time