Actually a good question from memeflaggot OP

The most dominant of the indeed much better Asian religions over time was Buddhism, which had an excessively passive element to it, often some lack of respect for warriors & weapons

Note too that the West really accelerated once Christianity started to be in the rear-view mirror. This was true in Phase 1 of Christian rejection, the pro-pagan surge of the Renaissance, and Phase 2 in the 1700s, Enlightenment deism and whatnot