Islam as an Abusive System: A Transactional Analysis of Pathology and Abuse
Introduction
Transactional Analysis (TA), pioneered by Dr. Eric Berne in works such as Games People Play (1964), provides a framework for understanding human interactions through ego states—Parent, Adult, and Child—and the unconscious “games” individuals play to fulfil ulterior motives, often at the expense of intimacy and autonomy. These games, as Berne defines them, are “an ongoing series of complementary ulterior transactions progressing to a well-defined, predictable outcome,” which can perpetuate cycles of manipulation and emotional harm.
In the context of Islam, this thesis posits the religion as an abusive system that systematically promotes imbalanced ego states and coercive games, fostering pathology through enforced submission. Islam’s core tenet of islam—meaning “submission”—encourages believers to operate predominantly from an Adapted Child ego state, responding to a Critical Parent archetype embodied by Allah and the Prophet Muhammad. This dynamic stifles the Adult ego’s rational autonomy and the Free Child’s spontaneity, leading to abusive pathologies such as chronic guilt, shame, and intergenerational trauma. Drawing on TA theory, the analysis reveals how doctrinal indoctrination teaches cultural games of obedience, mirroring abusive relationships where control masquerades as divine love.
Ego States in Islamic Doctrine: The Pathology of Perpetual Childhood
TA identifies three ego states: the Parent (nurturing or critical injunctions from authority figures), the Adult (objective, reality-based processing), and the Child (natural feelings and adaptations from early experiences). Healthy integration allows fluidity, but abusive systems rigidify these states, as Berne notes: “Each person shows three ego states: parent, adult, and child. In the ego state called parental behavior, individuals tend to behave similarly to how one of their parents acts, thinks, feels, talks, and reacts.”
In Islam, Allah is portrayed as an omnipotent Critical Parent, issuing 6,236 commandments in the Quran that demand unquestioning obedience, evoking an Adapted Child response of fear-driven compliance. This pathology manifests in the believer’s suppression of the Adult ego, which Berne describes as essential for “awareness, spontaneity, and intimacy,” capacities eroded by threats of eternal hellfire for doubt.
Thomas A. Harris, building on Berne in I’m OK—You’re OK (1967), observes the Parent-Child imbalance in religions: “The Parent-Child nature of most western religions is remarkable when one considers that the revolutionary impact of most revered religious leaders was directly the result of their courage to examine Parent institutions and proceed, with the Adult, in search of truth.”
Extending this to Islam, submission (tawhid) reinforces a “Not-OK Child” position, where believers internalize inferiority to divine authority, leading to pathological self-abnegation. As G. Henry Saruhan explains in “Transactional Analysis Theory and Spirituality” (2019), “People remember and become aware of spiritual and religious experiences through ego states. In their exteropsychic ego-state, people selectively interiorize models around the ideas, values, emotions, and behaviors offered by others.”
In Islamic contexts, this interiorization via rote memorization of the Quran from childhood embeds punitive Parent messages, pathologizing natural curiosity as shirk (polytheism), thus abusing the developing psyche into chronic dissociation from the Free Child.
This ego-state rigidity perpetuates abuse, as believers project Critical Parent dynamics onto family and society. Women, for instance, are scripted into submissive roles per Quranic injunctions (e.g., Surah 4:34), fostering intergenerational Adapted Child behaviors that normalize coercive control, akin to domestic abuse where the Adult voice is silenced.
Games of Submission: Coercive Transactions in Islamic Practice
Berne’s games are cultural scripts taught from childhood, with Islam exemplifying games that reward submission while punishing autonomy. “Raising children is primarily a matter of teaching them what games to play. Different cultures and different social classes favor different types of games, and various tribes and families favor different variations of these,” Berne writes, highlighting how Islamic upbringing instills games like ritual prayer (salah), a five-daily transaction reinforcing Child-to-Parent deference. These games provide illusory strokes (recognition) but culminate in predictable payoffs of guilt avoidance, not genuine intimacy.
A prime example is the game Tove K terms “Agree With My Stupid Idea,” adapted from Berne: “Throughout history, the game Agree With My Stupid Idea has mostly been played within the framework of religion. More or less all religions build on implausible ideas that require adherents to believe. You can’t build a religion around what is obviously true.” In Islam, this manifests in affirming contradictory doctrines, such as predestination alongside free will, coercing believers into cognitive dissonance that pathologizes rational inquiry. The payoff? Social reinforcement from the ummah (community), but at the cost of Adult autonomy, breeding abusive isolation for apostates.
Another game, “Now I’ve Got You, You Son of a Bitch” (Berne’s formulation for entrapment), appears in fatwas condemning perceived blasphemy, trapping dissenters in cycles of accusation and punishment. As Berne elucidates, “The favoured game of any individual can be traced back to his parents and grandparents, and forward to his children,” tracing Islamic games to Muhammad’s Medina constitution, which enforced tribal loyalty through shunning. This coercive pathology extends to jihad narratives, games of “Uproar” where outrage over cartoons or critiques justifies violence, fulfilling the Child’s need for Parent approval while abusing societal peace.
Pathology and Abuse: The Toll of Stunted Autonomy
The abusive core of Islam, per TA, lies in thwarting Berne’s triad of autonomy: awareness (suppressed by taqiyya—permissible deceit), spontaneity (curbed by haram prohibitions), and intimacy (redirected to divine rather than human bonds). Harris warns that unexamined Parent dogma breeds “fear and guilt,” a pathology echoed in Islamic eschatology’s graphic hell descriptions, inducing trauma akin to spiritual abuse. Saruhan notes, “Transactions can be experienced personally in the family and supportive of life, as well as punitively for justifying shame or limiting/restricting guilt,” illustrating how Islamic family structures—honor killings, forced marriages—punish via Child ego shame, perpetuating cycles of abuse.
This results in societal pathology: stifled innovation (Adult suppression), gender-based violence (Parent-Child coercion), and mental health crises, as believers remain “frogs” per Berne: “We are born princes and the civilizing process makes us frogs.” Reform is blocked by games like “If It Weren’t For the Infidels,” blaming external “others” for internal failings, a deflection that sustains the system’s abusive hold.
Conclusion
Through TA, Islam emerges as an abusive system engineering ego-state imbalance and addictive games that prioritize submission over human flourishing. As Berne urges escape via Adult awareness, deconstructing these dynamics offers pathology’s antidote: reclaiming autonomy to transcend coercive spirituality. This lens demands critical engagement to dismantle abuse masked as piety.
Index by Title and Author
• Games People Play, Eric Berne
• I’m OK—You’re OK, Thomas A. Harris
• Games People Play (Public Edition), Tove K
• Transactional Analysis Theory and Spirituality, G. Henry Saruhan
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