While the Muslim occupation of Cordoba was initially the result of the Islamic crusades in Spain, there is a case to be made that the state that subsequently emerged there was by the (rock-bottom) standards of the time a relatively tolerant place. But that “relatively” is a word that has too often got lost in more contemporary debate. And not just in the last few weeks. This intriguing piece by Marc Tracy in the (U.S.) Tablet (h/t: Reason) looks at how the idea of that long-lost emirate has been used in argument by Jewish historians:

According to Princeton historian Mark Cohen, the notion of convivencia, of medieval Spain as utopia, began with mid-19th century German-Jewish historians. Disappointed to find that emancipation did not equal equality, they crafted a long-ago world of true Jewish freedom as the model that their own world failed to live up to. “They looked back nostalgically to Muslim Spain, and said, ‘Look there,’ ” Cohen told me. “They wanted to embarrass the Christians.” They were not demanding a state of their own; on the contrary, they were demanding the right to live freely in another people’s state and, moreover, to be considered members of that people.
A subsequent batch of historians, under the spell of early-20th-century Zionism, cast medieval Spain not as a utopia but as, according to Cohen, “an unmitigated disaster.” They did so in order to argue that “Arab anti-Semitism is firmly rooted in a congenital, endemic Muslim/Arab Jew-hatred,” which in turn buttressed their case for a country of, by, and for the Jewish people.
So, which of those versions is right? Neither, Cohen said. In one essay, he refers to a “myth” (the German historians’ heaven) and a “counter-myth” (the Zionist historians’ hell) and asserts that the truth lies somewhere in between. Those who hold up the period as an ideal are exaggerating: “In a medieval situation,” he argues, “where you have monotheistic religions living in proximity, there is no such thing as toleration.” (In other words, tell “toleration” to the Jews of Granada, many of whom were massacred by angry Muslims in 1066, or to Granada’s Jewish vizier at the time, who was crucified.) And those who downplay the extent of tolerance and pluralism exaggerate, too. “If by convivencia,” said Cornell historian Ross Brann, “we mean that cultural and social proximity, conversation, and interaction among Jews, Muslims, and Christians were significant and productive,” then convivencia was real.

In a post over at Secular Right this weekend, Razib Khan also took a look at the way that different notions of Muslim Spain have been used, noting (quite reasonably) that “moderns tend to co-opt pre-moderns for their own ideological ends, when the pre-moderns had no such ideology.” That’s a point well worth remembering in a time when we are all too inclined to judge the past by the standards of the present.

For what it’s worth, my own take on the president’s initial response to the Cordoba House/Park51 controversy can also be found at the same Godless site.