Aaron Azriel, born in Jerusalem in 1809, was the grandson of Avigdor Azriel, the author of Zimrat ha-Areṣ, a student of Shalom Sharʿabi, and a rabbinical judge alongside Yom Tov Algazi. Aaron Azriel was a student of Yedidya Raphael Ḥayy Abulafia and so was inducted into the school of Bet El Kabbala by birth and personal affiliation.

Azriel was a leading Jerusalem scholar in both halakha and Kabbala. After Ibn Ṣaddīq, Joseph Abulafia's death, he became the leader of the Bet El kabbalists. Among his students was R. Yaʿaqov Meir, the future Sephardic chief rabbi. Azri…