Wise flight, and the women who provided
Jesus taught his disciples not to be rash, and said to them: “If they persecute you in this city, flee to the other; and if they persecute you in the other, flee again to another” (Matthew 10:23). And as he taught them, he became for them an example of a steady life, one that takes care not to go out to meet dangers at random, or at the wrong time, or without good reason. Here again Celsus maliciously misrepresents this, and his Jew says to Jesus: “With your disciples you run away, now here, now there.”
We shall say that the story told of Aristotle is just like what he slanders in Jesus and his disciples. For Aristotle saw that a court was about to be assembled against him as an impious man, because of certain doctrines of his philosophy which the Athenians thought impious. He withdrew from Athens and held his school at Chalcis, and he explained himself to his pupils, saying: “Let us leave Athens, so that we may not give the Athenians an occasion to bring on themselves a second guilt like their guilt over Socrates, and so that they may not commit impiety against philosophy a second time.”
He also says that Jesus “went about with his disciples collecting their food in a disgraceful and beggarly way.” Let him tell us where he found the disgrace and the beggarliness in this collecting. For in the Gospels “certain women” who “had been healed of” their “infirmities,” among whom was “Susanna,” provided the disciples with food “out of their own means” (Luke 8:2–3). Which of those who practised philosophy and devoted themselves to the good of their pupils did not receive from them what they needed? Or did the philosophers do this fittingly and well, while the disciples of Jesus, when they do the same, are accused by Celsus of “collecting their food in a disgraceful and beggarly way”?
Greek
Ἐπεὶ δὲ μὴ προπετεῖς εἶναι διδάσκων τοὺς μαθητὰς ὁ Ἰησοῦς ἔλεγεν αὐτοῖς τό· „ἐὰν διώκωσιν ὑμᾶς ἐν τῇ πόλει ταύτῃ, φεύγετε εἰς τὴν ἑτέραν· κἂν ἐν τῇ ἑτέρᾳ διώκωσι, πάλιν φεύγετε εἰς τὴν ἄλλην,“ καὶ διδάσκων παράδειγμα αὐτοῖς ἐγίνετο εὐσταθοῦς βίου, οἰκονομοῦντος μὴ εἰκῆ μηδ᾿ ἀκαίρως καὶ ἀλόγως ὁμόσε χωρεῖν τοῖς κινδύνοις· τοῦτο πάλιν κακουργῶν ὁ Κέλσος διαβάλλει, καί φησι πρὸς τὸν Ἰησοῦν ὁ παρ᾿ αὐτῷ Ἰουδαῖος ὅτι μετὰ τῶν μαθητῶν τῇδε κἀκεῖσε ἀποδιδράσκεις. ὅμοιον δὲ ᾗ πεποίηται κατὰ Ἰησοῦ καὶ τῶν μαθητῶν διαβολῇ φήσομεν εἶναι καὶ τὸ περὶ Ἀριστοτέλους ἱστορούμενον· οὗτος γὰρ ἰδὼν συγκροτεῖσθαι μέλλον κατ᾿ αὐτοῦ δικαστήριον ὡς κατὰ ἀσεβοῦς διά τινα δόγματα τῆς φιλοσοφίας αὐτοῦ, ἃ ἐνόμισαν εἶναι ἀσεβῆ Ἀθηναῖοι, ἀναχωρήσας ἀπὸ τῶν Ἀθηνῶν ἐν Χαλκίδι τὰς διατριβὰς ἐποιήσατο, ἀπολογησάμενος τοῖς γνωρίμοις καὶ λέγων· „ἀπίωμεν ἀπὸ τῶν Ἀθηνῶν, ἵνα μὴ πρόφασιν δῶμεν Ἀθηναίοις τοῦ δεύτερον ἄγος ἀναλαβεῖν παραπλήσιον τῷ κατὰ Σωκράτους, καὶ ἵνα μὴ δεύτερον εἰς φιλοσοφίαν ἀσεβήσωσι.“ φησὶ δὲ τὸν Ἰησοῦν μετὰ τῶν μαθητῶν αἰσχρῶς καὶ γλίσχρως τὰς τροφὰς συλλέγοντα περιεληλυθέναι. πόθεν λαβὼν, ἀπαγγελλέτω, τὸ αἰσχρὸν καὶ τὸ γλίσχρον τῆς συλλογῆς· ἐν γὰρ τοῖς εὐαγγελίοις „γυναῖκές τινες,“ „τεθεραπευμέναι ἀπὸ“ τῶν „ἀσθενειῶν“ αὐτῶν, ἐν αἷς ἦν καὶ „Σουσάννα“, παρεῖχον τοῖς μαθηταῖς „ἐκ τῶν ὑπαρχόντων αὐταῖς“ τροφάς. τίς δὲ τῶν φιλοσοφούντων καὶ ἀνακειμένων ὠφελίᾳ γνωρίμων οὐκ ἀπ᾿ αὐτῶν ἐλάμβανε τὰ πρὸς τὰς χρείας; ἢ ἐκεῖνοι μὲν τοῦτο καθηκόντως ἐποίουν καὶ καλῶς, ἐπὰν δ᾿ οἱ Ἰησοῦ μαθηταὶ πράττωσιν αὐτὸ, κατηγοροῦνται ὑπὸ Κέλσου ὡς αἰσχρῶς καὶ γλίσχρως συλλέγοντες τὰς τροφάς;