Hagiazō (ἁγιάζω) is the verb form of the adjective hagios (ἅγιος, holy, set apart). The Septuagint uses hagiazō to translate the Hebrew qadash (קדש), the verb of consecration that runs through Leviticus and the priestly literature: setting apart for YHWH, devoting to sacred use, separating from common use. The Hebraic substrate carries the field of dedicated belonging rather than ethical purity in the abstract.

BDAG: to treat as holy, to dedicate to the service of God, to consecrate. Louw-Nida 53.44 places it in the domain of religious activities under purification and dedication. The verb operates in a relational frame: something or someone is set apart TO a person or purpose, not merely cleansed.

In Ephesians 5:26 the verb governs the husband's action toward his wife. After Paul names the cross as the husband's pattern in 5:25 (Christ loved the ekklesia and gave Himself up for her), 5:26 continues: hina autēn hagiasē (in order that He might sanctify her). The pronoun shifts grammatically between Messiah and the husband as the passage layers the analogy. The husband's posture toward his wife is consecratory: he treats her as set apart, devoted, holy in the relational sense. This is not management vocabulary. It is priestly vocabulary, applied to the marriage. The Hebraic root qadash is the substrate; the husband's love is consecratory, not custodial.