It was tolerant for its time. I don't know for sure, but I'm guessing that if we're talking the 8th through 10th centuries, then blasphemy, heresy and apostasy was punishable by death,
That's right. The emirate/caliphate of Cordoba was throughout its history a sharia state like Saudia Arabia where "blasphemy (against Islam), heresy (against Islam) and apostasy (from Islam) were punishable by death." If that is Islam at its most "tolerant" then I wouldn't like to see it at its least.
But that doesn't mean that religious minorities were not tolerated,
The caliphate of Cordoba was a sharia state where, like other similar historical sharia states, conquered communities of Jews, Christians and others classified as "Peoples of the Book" were "tolerated" according to the Koranic commandment:
Fight those who believe not in Allah nor the Last Day, nor hold that forbidden which hath been forbidden by Allah and His Messenger, nor acknowledge the religion of Truth, of the People of the Book, until they pay the Jizya with willing submission, and feel themselves subduedWhy, the Islamic overlords of India even "tolerated" the idol-worshipping hindus, although - where the nominally Muslim ruler wasn't a religious cynic like mughal emperor Akbar - this was due more to the impracticalities of carrying out the Koranic commandment to slaughter them all if they refused to accept Islam. Osama bin Laden would I am sure extend a similar "tolerance" to Jews and Christians were his dream of a global sharia state ever fulfilled. Very kind of the Muslims to "tolerate" the indingenous inhabitants of the lands they brutally conquered.
especially in comparison with the status of religious minorities in Christendom at the time
Like contemporary Christian countries, historical Islamic states were "tolerant" of their Jews and other religious minorities except when they weren't. There were Jews being tolerated somewhere in Christian Europe throughout the period of the Cordoba emirate/caliphate. Furthermore, Muslims in the Iberian peninsula themselves lived as "tolerated" subjects under Christian rulers in reconquered territory - until they were finally offered the option of conversion to Christianity or emigration and ultimately expelled en masse. Similarly, Christian rulers in the middle east ruled over Muslim subjects during the Crusading period.
If the proposed ground zero mosque is being named "Cordoba" in celebration of a historical sharia state in Spain then that is cause for concern, as is your defense of the wretched place as a beacon of "tolerance".
Topic: Ground Zero Mosque being Called "Cordoba House"