A reflection on our understanding of reality in the 21st century reveals a disturbing picture about our state of humanity. No longer bound by objective moral criteria and social norms, modern societies work in ways that undermine the meaning of human agency and destroy the natural world. As we further develop economically and expand our technological abilities, we lose our grip on the essential meaning of existence. In the words of Amin Maalouf, "we have embarked on this century without a compass."This is a universal problem extending from advanced industrial societies in Europe and North America to the Muslim world, Africa and Asia. The subjectivist and monopolizing mindset of modernity leaves nothing untouched. It penetrates everything from our homes and towns to education, trade, politics and culture. The weapons of mass destructions that can kill thousands in one instant, as the world watched in horror in Hiroshima and Nagasaki 70 years ago, join the manual beheadings of Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) terrorists in a spectacle of violence that recognizes no boundaries. Violence and barbarism takes on new dimensions with new technological capabilities. No religious doctrine or moral principle is able to stop this insanity.The collapse of traditional morality has had a major impact on this outcome. Two important consequences have followed: the rise of modern subjectivism and the spread of relativism. The rise of modern relativism goes back to the demise of the Christian worldview and Europe's opening to new worlds. When European intellectuals came face to face with the reality of other religions, cultures and civilizations, they thought they had obtained an arsenal of arguments against the hegemony of scholastic doctrines. Rene Descartes's subject-centered certainty sought to secure a foundation for our knowledge of the world: the vacuum created by the demise of the medieval worldview had to be filled by another set of principles and ideas. But Descartes's attempt to find a secure ground ended up in an intractable solipsism. His famous dictum "cogito ergo sum" (I think therefore I am) was supposed to establish the objective existence of the outside world. Instead, it led to the experience of things in my mind.Lest we think this is an abstract philosophical point, consider its huge consequences for the ways in which we think about the universe and ourselves in the modern world. It is my mind and nothing else that establishes the existence of the world. "My mind" or my ability to think becomes the basis of all certainty. By extension, this makes me, the knowing subject, the sole possessor of meaning, purpose and authority over the world. One more step and we start divinizing ourselves! Worse, we begin demonizing others through political subjugation, economic exploitation and cultural imperialism.In his "The Philosophical Discourse of Modernity," the German philosopher Jurgen Habermas summarizes this subjectivist component in modern thought with "the principle of subjectivity:" "In establishing the principle of subjectivity ... religious faith became reflective; the world of the divine was changed in the solitude of subjectivity into something posited by ourselves...in modernity, therefore, religious life, state and society, as well as science, morality and art are transformed into just so many embodiments of the principle of subjectivity."Martin Heidegger considers the rise of epistemology to the center of modern Western thought to be a victory of skepticism. It is the skeptic's questions about the reality of the external world that guides the conceptual agenda of modern epistemology. For Heidegger, this has had two grave consequences: the oblivion of the "question of Being" (Seinsfrage) and the rise of subjectivism.With modern notions of knowledge, man is turned into a special subject that has power and priority over all things. The Enlightenment project that begun with the idea of rejecting theo-centrism ended up with a radical version of anthropo-centrism. In this new paradigm, the human subject is defined as a self-defining and autonomous being that sees itself above the world, the cosmos, history, time, society, tradition and ethics.The idea that I must have full freedom and sovereignty without any responsibility penetrates most modern societies. Both the secular ideals of the Enlightenment and the religious ideas of the tradition are subjectivized and relativized in order to garner more power and dominance over the world.Paradoxically, modern relativism produces its anti-thesis: each relative perspective is presented as an absolute and imposed on others. The "economic hit men" of the modern world twist all rules to make more profit and present this as "rational behavior." The religious radicals of the Muslim, Christian, Jewish or Buddhist traditions distort religious texts to justify their violent actions and present this as devotion. Relativism and absolutism go hand in hand in our modern claims of knowledge.The first step to overcome this conceptual anomaly is to go back to the ancient wisdom that reality is larger than us. Reality is larger than our mental constructions of it. We human beings are part of a reality that is not only larger than us but also has its own meaning and significance.To fully understand this, we need knowledge, wisdom, prudence and patience. A proper understanding of reality entails the acknowledgment of what we might call epistemic humility. It suggests that no matter how competent we claim to be, we cannot encircle the great chain of being, just as we cannot step outside of it. Recognizing our place in it is more important than seeking to own it like a property.This ancient wisdom also teaches us that we cannot treat the world of existence in any way we want without social and moral consequences. Freedom comes with responsibility, and this applies to our dealings with the natural environment as well as other human beings with whom we share the universe. Epistemic humility rather than hubris should guide our behavior toward the universe, ourselves and other fellow human beings.