This question is inspired by a 2003 column on the NYTimes titled "Was the Islam Of Old Spain Truly Tolerant?" by Edward Rothstein.
But as many scholars have argued, this image is distorted. Even the Umayyad dynasty, begun by Abd al-Rahman in 756, was far from enlightened. Issues of succession were often settled by force. One ruler murdered two sons and two brothers. Uprisings in 805 and 818 in Córdoba were answered with mass executions and the destruction of one of the city's suburbs. Wars were accompanied by plunder, kidnappings and ransom. Córdoba itself was finally sacked by Muslim Berbers in 1013, its epochal library destroyed.
Andalusian governance was also based on a religious tribal model. Christians and Jews, who shared Islam's Abrahamic past, had the status of dhimmis -- alien minorities. They rose high but remained second-class citizens; one 11th-century legal text called them members of ''the devil's party.'' They were subject to special taxes and, often, dress codes. Violence also erupted, including a massacre of thousands of Jews in Grenada in 1066 and the forced exile of many Christians in 1126.
Unfortunately, the author of the column provided no references to the "But as many scholars have argued..." line. I'd love to get reading recommendations exactly of this topic.
Thanks in advance!
In my opinion, the two critical works are David Nirenberg's Communities of Violence: Persecution of Minorities in the Middle Ages (1996) and Maria Rosa Menocal's Ornament of the World: How Muslims, Jews, and Christians Created a Culture of Tolerance in Medieval Spain (2002). Both books are beautiful reads and sure to evoke a strong reaction.
This article seems to be Rothstein's reaction: a rejection of Menocal's then-recent book about tolerance (what he means by "this image") in preference for views earlier established by Nirenberg and others about violence. But both Nirenberg and Menocal were making scholarly arguments full of nuance. In my opinion, both authors leave space for tolerance and violence to coexist in their visions of medieval Spain. I'd recommend reading both, probably starting with Nirenberg.
Rothstein only wants to see one side of things. He cherry picks examples of Muslim violence from almost 800 years of history to argue that medieval Spanish Islam was intolerant. This argument has methodological problems. I'm uncertain that his examples are a representative sample of Andalusian history. Rothstein doesn't show how these acts of intolerance are in fact symptomatic of Islam, so there's no "smoking gun" to show how these examples demonstrate specifically Islamic intolerance. And he doesn't attempt a comparative analysis, which would quickly show that these acts of intolerance were not in fact uniquely Muslim. His handling of both evidence and argument are therefore insufficient to provide a reliable answer to his question: "Was the Islam of Old Spain Truly Tolerant?"
I was, however, a bit perplexed at the supporting evidence he adduces. He cites Joel Kraemer, whose career seems to have been more narrowly focused on Greek and Judaic theological influences on medieval Islam. And he gives a rather thought-provoking analysis of the Alahambra palace/fortress in Granada. But I'm not sure how either of these actually connects to his main arguments. I don't know whether Kraemer ever wrote specifically to consider issues of tolerance, or whether Rothstein's analysis of the Alhambra was rooted in or supported by scholarly study. There might be literature here that I simply haven't seen.
I second /u/textandtrowel and /u/TheRealGC13's recommendations. I'd also recommend a few more:
Medieval Iberia, a collection of primary sources edited by Olivia Constable
The Medieval Spains, by Bernard Reilly
The Martyrs of Cordoba, by Jessica Coope
The Arab Conquest of Spain and Early Medieval Spain by Roger Collins
The Caliphate in the West by David Wasserstein (same author as The Rise and Fall of the Party Kings)
The Rise and Fall of the Party Kings by David Wasserstein would probably be quite enlightening if you have access to a library that either has it or can get it through inter-library loan. It actually spends a lot of time talking about the situation before the taifa period where the single state broke up into many competing ones.