DEUT808 The earliest legislation of the Bible contains special provisions for the helpless, and for the amelioration of their lot (Exodus 22: 20–26; 23:6-12). The still more humanitarian law of Deuteronomy is particularly insistent upon regard for those in want. It urges liberality toward the poor, the manumitted slave and the landless Levite and consideration for the hired servant, the fugitive slave and the unprotected foreigner. With grim realism coupled with deepest sympathy, the Deuteronomic Code states: (this verse). The enjoyment of God's bounties must be shared with those who are in need (16:11, 14). Acts of kindness rate as tzedakah (24:13). The still more advanced Code of Holiness prescribes that the corners of the field, the gleanings and the fallen fruit of the vineyard shall be left unharvested. The original purpose of this legislation may have been, as Frazer suggests, to leave some of the corn for the spirits of vegetation on whom the following harvest depended. Spirits of the Corn and of the Wild, I. p. 2234ff.; A.S. Peake, A Commentary of the Bible, p. 207. That motive is wholly forgotten and the humanitarian purpose is announced: "Thou shall leave them for the poor and for the stranger" (Leviticus 19:9-10; 23:22; Deuteronomy 24:21f.; Ruth).