Musannaf Ibn Abi Shaybah 26135 — Eating with the leper

It is narrated from al-Rabi' bin Khuthaym that he said to his family: Prepare for me a sweet of dates and ghee. The narrator said: The family prepared it. Then he called a man who suffered from madness. Al-Rabi' began feeding him morsel by morsel while his saliva was running. When he had eaten and left, his wife said to al-Rabi': We took so much trouble in making this sweet, and you fed it to him? What does he know of what he has eaten? Al-Rabi' replied: But Allah Almighty knows.