“Thaumazontes” is Luke’s word. It means something like “filled with wonder.” (“Thauma” means “a wonder” or “something wonderful,” as well as more mundane things like “a puppet show.”) It can mean admiring something, or being amazed by it, or being startled by it, or wondering and thinking about it. It can also mean “respect,” “honor,” or even “worship” in various pagan Greek contexts; or it can mean mundane things, like “I wonder why Basil isn’t here” or “I wonder if such and such will happen.”
So let’s consider one of the oldest uses of the word. In the Odyssey, the townspeople “wonder” at young Telemachos speaking so boldly about the bad suitors of his mom Penelope. It’s not anything they didn’t know about, since the suitors were being a pain in their very town, to their own relatives and friends; and it certainly wasn’t anything that Telemachos didn’t know about. They were just strongly impressed by Telemachos’ bold manner of telling the known facts, since he was young and the suitors were nasty bandits. They had known him all his life; but suddenly, they saw what kind of man he might become, and was already becoming.
Another early Homeric use is in the Iliad, where King Priam slips through enemy lines to meet Achilles and beg for his son’s body. Both men see each other up close and “marvel” at each other – Achilles being tall and handsome and godlike, and Priam being kingly and wise and good to listen to. Each of them had seen each other from afar, earlier in the poem, among all the other famous men on the battlefield or watching from Troy’s walls. But they were struck by each other, impressed in a new and deeper way. Achilles suddenly sees Priam as a human being and a father of a beloved dead son, not as his enemy; and Priam sees Achilles as a person instead of an invader. Suddenly they were host and guest, filled with the same purpose of burying Hector, not adversaries at all.
It’s the pivot point of the entire long poem, when the world goes still and changes forever, even though nothing new has been added to the situation. Knowledge did not change; a wisdom of perception and response was added.
If a prophet talks to you, you will be struck by what he says, in a different way than if you just know how things are supposed to go, according to Biblical prophecy. Most times in the Bible, prophets tell people what they already know they should be doing, and how they already knew things were likely to go. It’s a sign, or a kick in the heinie, and not a brand new piece of information. Simeon is telling Mary and Joseph to get serious, and they do get serious. They stop and wonder.
And yes, Luke was exactly the guy to use this specific Greek word for this specific purpose. Anything Homeric in a serious Greek book is a big red flag, just like us quoting Shakespeare would be.
