Classical Mediterranean practices specified that, when two people made a contract with each other, each would swear to the gods he honored to abide by the terms of the contract.
Judaism, and its followers Christianity and Islam, innovated a different approach, the idea that someone who doesn't follow your god can't be trusted to adhere to an agreement. This made them antagonistic to other cultures, which worked out great for Christianity and Islam (the memes themselves, not the people carrying them).
Religious practices farther east, in India[1], China, and the central Asian steppes, were generally not exclusive in the same way. You were free to mix and match practices and avowed beliefs from several formal systems, and they didn't factionalize in the same way.
On the other hand, Chinese Confucianism, considered as a system of how society is organized (as opposed to a system of thought) was quite hostile to other modes of organization.
My take is that governments don't coexist easily, but philosophies do.
Judaism, and its followers Christianity and Islam, innovated a different approach, the idea that someone who doesn't follow your god can't be trusted to adhere to an agreement. This made them antagonistic to other cultures, which worked out great for Christianity and Islam (the memes themselves, not the people carrying them).
Religious practices farther east, in India[1], China, and the central Asian steppes, were generally not exclusive in the same way. You were free to mix and match practices and avowed beliefs from several formal systems, and they didn't factionalize in the same way.
On the other hand, Chinese Confucianism, considered as a system of how society is organized (as opposed to a system of thought) was quite hostile to other modes of organization.
My take is that governments don't coexist easily, but philosophies do.
[1] Islam excepted.