minbarArticle Free Pass minbar, in Islām, the pulpit from which
the sermon (khuṭbah) is delivered. In its simplest form the
minbar is a platform with three steps; often it is constructed
as a domed box at the top of a staircase and is reached through
a doorway that can be closed. Muḥammad originally delivered his
khuṭbahs while leaning against a palm-trunk pillar in the mosque
at Medina. Ḥadīth (accounts of Muḥammad’s life and sayings)
report that Muḥammad later used a seat with two steps for
receiving delegations in the mosque and also that he preached
from this portable minbar, which was fashioned from tamarisk
wood by a Greek or Abyssinian carpenter. His successors, the
caliphs, used his minbar as a symbol of their authority. During
the first century of Islām, provincial governors also came to
use the minbar, from which they made speeches and heard
petitions, primarily in their capacity as rulers. When the
khuṭbah lost its informative, political, and discursive
character and became a purely religious sermo