RARE biography of a preeminent Sephardic rabbinical scholar Rabbi Haim Yosef David Azulai ben Yitzhak Zerachia (1724-1806), commonly known by the acronym of his name as the Hida (or Chida). Born in Ottoman Jerusalem as the scion of a prominent rabbinic family, the great-great-grandson of Moroccan Rabbi Abraham Azulai (the Yosef part of his name coming from his mother`s father, Rabbi Yosef Bialer), the Hida studied with rabbis Isaac HaKohen Rapoport, Shalom Sharabi, and Haim ibn Attar (the Ohr HaHaim) as well as Jonah Nabon, and from an early age showed proficiency in Talmud, Kabbalah, and Jewish history, becoming a most prolific authored of about a hundred works in every area of rabbinic literature, a noted bibliophile and pioneer in the publication of Jewish religious writings. His writings range from a prayer book he edited and arranged (`Tefillat Yesharim`) to a vast spectrum of Halachic literature including a commentary on the Shulhan Aruch titled `Birkei Yosef` which appears in most editions. The Hida was also shadar (or emissary), who left Israel twice on five-year-long fundraising missions that took him as far west as Tunisia and as far north as Great Britain and Amsterdam, his mission being to raise money for the support and survival of the beleaguered Jewish community of Hebron (while traveling he also visited the famous libraries of Italy and France, where he examined the Hebrew manuscripts). 235x155mm. 252 pages. Illustrated Hardcover. Rear cover corners slightly bumped. Spine edges bumped. This extremely rare biography of one of the most illustrious 18th-century Jewish personalities is otherwise in very good condition.