enable

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

• transitive verb To supply with the means, knowledge, or opportunity (to do something); make able.
• transitive verb To make feasible or possible.
• transitive verb To give legal power, capacity, or sanction to.
• transitive verb To make operational; activate.
• transitive verb To behave in a manner that facilitates or supports (another's abusive, addictive, or self-destructive behavior).

from The Century Dictionary.

• To make able; furnish with adequate power, ability, means, or authority; render competent.
• To put in an efficient state or condition; endow; equip; fit out.
• Synonyms To empower, qualify, capacitate.
• To give ability or competency.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

• transitive verb obsolete To give strength or ability to; to make firm and strong.
• transitive verb To make able (to do, or to be, something); to confer sufficient power upon; to furnish with means, opportunities, and the like; to render competent for; to empower; to endow.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

• verb To give strength or ability to; to make firm and strong.
• verb To make able (to do, or to be, something); to confer sufficient power upon; to furnish with means, opportunities, and the like; to render competent for; to empower; to endow.
• verb To allow a way out or excuse for an action.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

• verb render capable or able for some task