After the death of King Josiah and the imprisonment of his son Jehoahaz by the Egyptians, Jehoiakim began to rule Judah as a 'puppet' of the Egyptians. This period proved to be a most difficult one for Jeremiah, who openly condemned the worship that went on in the Temple and the failure of the people of Jerusalem to understand the nature of the God they claimed to worship. As a result of his open condemnation of the national sanctuary, Jeremiah found himself in serious conflict with the priests, the cult prophets and the leaders of Judah. The trouble began with a sermon which he preached in the court of the Temple, probably in the year 608 B.C. after Jehoiakim had become king. The account of the sermon and its consequences is given in Jeremiah 7 and 26.