Bound morpheme — rarely stands alone. Lives in three families: religious (圣经, 圣母), Confucian/imperial (圣人, 圣旨), and 'master of X' (剑圣, 诗圣).
history
Traditional 聖 is ear (耳) + mouth (口) + king-on-platform (壬) — a ruler who listens and speaks wisely. The 1956 reform reused a much older obscure 5-stroke graph (又 over 土) as a replacement; the modern silhouette has no etymological tie to holiness.
Bottom 土 — the indexing radical. Files 圣 under earth on purely graphic grounds; the 'sacred / saint' meaning was carried over from displaced 聖 when the reform reused this shorter shape.
Top 又 — a pictograph of a right hand. Sits over the earth radical to give a memorable 'hand on earth' silhouette. The shape was borrowed wholesale in the 1956 reform to replace 13-stroke 聖; it carries no original 'holy' meaning.
