R. Hayyim Joseph David Azula (Hida, 1724–1806), halakhist, kabbalist, emissary, and bibliographer. Azulai was born in Jerusalem; he was descended on his father's side a prominent family of rabbis and kabbalists from Spain while his mother was a daughter of Joseph Bialer who had gone to Erez Israel with R. Judah Hasid in 1770. He studied under some of the outstanding Jewish scholars of his age including R. Jonah Navon, R. Isaac ha-Kohen Rapoport, and R. Hayyim ibn Attar. Azulai attained early eminence in Jewish studies and was regarded by the Jewry of the Ottoman Empire and of Italy as the leading scholar of his generation. He was highly esteemed, too, by the Jews of Germany, especially after the publication of his works.

Possessed of great intellectual powers and many-faceted talents, he combined a religious and mystical ardor with an insatiable intellectual curiosity. Added to these were critical ability, a facile pen, and a boundless capacity for work. He spent most of his active years traveling abroad as an emissary of the communities of Erez Israel for the collection of funds for the upkeep of the academies and scholars. Between 1753 and 1758 he visited Italy, Germany, Holland, France, and England as shali'ah of the Hebron Yeshivah. During these travels he refused the call to become hakham of the Sephardim in Amsterdam. On his return to Jerusalem, where he remained for some seven years, he served as dayyan and engaged in communal activities. He also became a member of R. Shalom Sharabi's esoteric group of kabbalists, Ahavat Shalom. He left Erez Israel again in 1764, having been delegated to travel to Constantinople to intercede on behalf of the scholars in their disputes with the communal leaders, but learning en route that the communal leaders had triumphed in the dispute and of the consequent futility of his proceeding on his mission, he remained in Cairo where he served briefly as rabbi. Azulai returned in 1769 and settled in Hebron where he was held in high esteem. In 1772 he again went abroad as the emissary of Hebron, this time devoting most of his efforts to Italy where, on his earlier visit, he had gained many admirers. Having sent a large sum of money to Hebron which relieved the financial difficulties of its community, he ended his mission in 1778 in Leghorn, where he spent the rest of his life.

In his literary diary Ma‘agal Tov (Good Path) which covers the years 1753–78, with some later jottings (full ed. by A. Freimann, 1921–34), he entered every idea and novel thought in the field of Jewish scholarship, history, and folklore which occurred to him on his travels. This diary is an invaluable source of information regarding not only his own experiences but also the circumstances, personalities, and bibliographical treasures of the places which Azulai visited, in particular in Italy, Holland, and France. From this diary he later drew the material for his numerous works on a variety of subjects to which he devoted the latter part of his life. His chief claims to fame as a halakhist rest on his glosses to the Shulhan Arukh, contained in his Birkei Yosef (1774), Mahazik Berakhah (1785), and Shiyyurei Berakhah (1771–76), which complemented R. Hayyim Benveniste's Keneset ha-Gedolah with citations from later halakhic works and from numerous manuscripts. In his books Va'ad la-Hakhamim (1796) and Shem ha-Gedolim (1, 1774; 2, 1786; scholarly ed., 1853), Azulai followed in the footsteps of R. Shabbetai Bass, adding 1,300 bibliographical references to the approximately 2,200 already contained in the Siftei Yeshenim. Azulai seems to have been the first Hebrew writer to be interested in collecting Jewish folk-stories in a systematic way. In his Zikhron Ma'asiyyot ve-Nissim he listed hundreds of these; in most cases he wrote down only a detail or two, to identify them, whereas less famous stories were given in greater detail or in full. Many stories were related of the wonders and miracles Azulai performed. Pilgrimages were made to his tomb at Leghorn until, some 150 years after his death, in 1960, his remains were reinterred in Jerusalem.

מחזור לשלוש רגלים. בפרט השנה יש לחשב את שם ה' במילואו. נדפס דף-על-דף כמו הוצאת ליוורנו תרל"ד. מגילת רות עם תרגום לאדינו.