Sinners chosen to show the healing of souls
Since Celsus also called the apostles of Jesus notorious men, saying that they were “tax collectors and sailors of the worst sort,” we will say about this too that he seems to believe what is written where he wishes, so that he can bring a charge against our teaching, but to disbelieve the Gospels so that he need not accept the Godhead plainly proclaimed in those same books. Yet he ought to have recognised the writers' love of truth from their record of the less creditable things, and so to have believed them about the more divine things too.
Now it is written in the catholic epistle of Barnabas, from which Celsus perhaps took his claim that the apostles were notorious and of the worst sort, that Jesus “chose his own apostles, who were more lawless than all lawlessness” (Epistle of Barnabas 5:9). And in the Gospel according to Luke, Peter says to Jesus: “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, Lord” (Luke 5:8). Paul too, who himself afterwards became an apostle of Jesus, says in the letter to Timothy: “The saying is trustworthy, that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the first” (1 Timothy 1:15).
I do not know how Celsus forgot, or did not think, to say something about Paul, who after Jesus firmly founded the churches that are in Christ. For it is likely that he saw that the story of Paul would call for an answer from him: how Paul, after he had persecuted the church of God (Galatians 1:13) and fought bitterly against the believers, so far as to want to hand the disciples of Jesus over to death (Acts 22:4), later changed so greatly that “from Jerusalem as far as Illyricum” he “fully preached the gospel of Christ” (Romans 15:19), “making it his aim to preach the gospel” so as not to build “on someone else's foundation” (Romans 15:20), but to build where the gospel of God in Christ had not been preached at all.
What is out of place, then, if Jesus, wishing to show the human race how great a skill in healing souls he has, chose men who were notorious and of the worst sort, and led them on so far that they became a pattern of the purest character for those who were brought through them to the gospel of Christ?
Greek
Ἐπεὶ δὲ καὶ ἐπιῤῥήτους εἶπεν ἀνθρώπους, τελώνας καὶ ναύτας πονηροτάτους λέγων ὁ Κέλσος τοὺς ἀποστόλους Ἰησοῦ, καὶ περὶ τούτου φήσομεν ὅτι ἔοικεν, ἵνα μὲν ἐγκαλέσῃ τῷ λόγῳ, πιστεύειν ὅπου θέλει τοῖς γεγραμμένοις. ἵνα δὲ τὴν ἐμφαινομένην θειότητα ἐν τοῖς αὐτοῖς βιβλίοις ἀπαγγελλομένην μὴ παραδέξηται, ἀπιστεῖν τοῖς εὐαγγελίοις· δέον τὸ φιλάληθες ἰδόντα τῶν γραψάντων ἐκ τῆς περὶ τῶν χειρόνων ἀναγραφῆς πιστεῦσαι καὶ περὶ τῶν θειοτέρων. γέγραπται δὴ ἐν τῇ Βαρνάβα καθολικῇ ἐπιστολῇ, ὅθεν ὁ Κέλσος λαβὼν τάχα εἶπεν εἶναι ἐπιῤῥήτους καὶ πονηροτάτους τοὺς ἀποστόλους, ὅτι „ἐξελέξατο τοὺς ἰδίους ἀποστόλους“ Ἰησοῦς, „ὄντας ὑπὲρ πᾶσαν ἀνομίαν ἀνομωτέρους.“ καὶ ἐν τῷ εὐαγγελίῳ δὲ τῷ κατὰ Αουκᾶν φησι πρὸς τὸν Ἰησοῦν ὁ Πέτρος· „ἔξελθε ἀπ᾿ ἐμοῦ, ὅτι ἀνὴρ ἁμαρτωλός εἰμι, κύριε.“ ἀλλὰ καὶ ὁ Παῦλος ἐν τῇ πρὸς Τιμόθεόν φησι, καὶ αὐτὸς ὕστερον ἀπόστολος Ἰησοῦ γενόμενος, ὅτι „πιστὸς ὁ λόγος,“ „ὅτι Ἰησοῦς Χριστὸς ἦλθεν εἰς τὸν κόσμον ἁμαρτωλοὺς σῶσαι, ὧν πρῶτός εἰμι ἐγώ.“ οὐκ οἶδα δ᾿ ὅπως ἐπελάθετο ἢ οὐκ ἐνόησεν περὶ Παύλου τι εἰπεῖν, τοῦ μετὰ τὸν Ἰησοῦν τὰς ἐν Χριστῷ πήξαντος ἐκκλησίας. εἰκὸς γὰρ ὅτι ἑώρα δεῖσθαι αὐτῷ ἀπολογίας τὸν περὶ Παύλου λόγον, πῶς διώξας τὴν ἐκκλησίαν τοῦ θεοῦ καὶ πικρῶς ἀγωνισάμενος κατὰ τῶν πιστευόντων, ὡς καὶ εἰς θάνατον παραδιδόναι ἐθέλειν τοὺς Ἰησοῦ μαθητὰς, ὕστερον ἐπὶ τοσοῦτον μετεβάλετο, ὡς „ἀπὸ Ἱερουσαλὴμ μέχρι τοῦ Ἰλλυρικοῦ πεπληρωκέναι τὸ εὐαγγέλιον τοῦ Χριστοῦ“ καὶ „φιλοτιμούμενον εὐαγγελίζεσθαι,“ ὥστε „μὴ ἐπ᾿ ἀλλότριον θεμέλιον“ οἰκοδομεῖν, ἀλλ᾿ ὅπου μηδὲ τὴν ἀρχὴν ἐκηρύχθη τὸ ἐν Χριστῷ εὐαγγέλιον τοῦ θεοῦ. τί οὖν ἄτοπον βουλόμενον παραστῆσαι τῷ γένει τῶν ἀνθρώπων τὸν Ἰησοῦν, ὁπηλίκην ἔχει ψυχῶν ἰατρικὴν, τοὺς ἐπιῤῥήτους καὶ πονηροτάτους ἐπιλέξασθαι καὶ τούτους προαγαγεῖν ἐπὶ τοσοῦτον, ὥστ᾿ αὐτοὺς παράδειγμα εἶναι ἤθους καθαρωτάτου τοῖς δι᾿ αὐτῶν προσαγομένοις τῷ Χριστοῦ εὐαγγελίῳ;