that he might sanctify it, having cleansed it by the washing of water with the word,
To sanctify is to separate the church to God; this happens through forgiveness of sins and the Spirit's renewal. Baptism is the outward pledge of this inward reality, but guard against the superstition that reduces a sacrament to an idol. Water does not cleanse the soul; only Christ's blood does. Put no confidence in the sign or the minister; let baptism lead you straight to Christ alone.
AI summary
The husband is to pursue his wife's holiness as Christ pursues the church's. Just as a bride was purified and prepared for marriage in those days through washing and anointing, so the church is made pure and holy, outwardly by water's symbol, inwardly by truth applied to the heart, not by ceremony or miraculous power, but by faithful application of God's word.
AI summary
So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies,.... It is a common saying with the Jews, that a man's wife is "as his own body" (r); and it is one of the precepts of their wise men, that a man should honour his wife more than his body, , and "love her as his body" (s); for as they also say, they...