He also provided patronage to the followers of different religions while he himself remained and adherent of Buddhism. The coming together of religions is neither a novel idea nor something difficult to obtain. In our modern times guides like Gandhi, Martin Luther King, and Bishop Desmond Tutu were all apostles of non-violence, religiously inspired. Often the ascetic inspired by spirituality conquers the emperor by strength of his faith. It is well known that in pluralistic societies the common people, being exposed to the experience of each other's belief system and practices, often manage to merge them.
People begin sharing experiences and practices out of neighborly courtesy.
This they manage to do without infringing their own basic belief systems. They accommodate the divergent only to the extent that no major infringement of their own faith might occur. The songs sung in rituals may be adapted from one religion to fill a need in another. Often an accommodation is found to insert the traditions and forms of an older religion into the new religion of a conqueror, or of one who evangelizes a local population. An example is the continuity of the Christmas tree tradition in Christianity, even though Odin and Thor have been abandoned and Jesus has replaced them.