Greek name of the city known in the Bible as Aven or On (Heb. “‘on”, from the Egyptian “iwnw”, cf. the Coptic “on”, “light”). City that in ancient times was the capital of Lower Egypt, a few kilometers east of the Nile, in the Delta, about 30 km from Memphis. It appears under the name of Heliopolis in the LXX (Ex. 1:11).
Jeremiah calls her Beth-shemesh (Jer. 43:13). Isaiah seems to allude to it (Is. 19:18). A slight change in the first letter of its name transforms its meaning from “city of the sun” to “city of destruction.”
If this reading, proposed by numerous exegetes, is accepted, the passage would mean that the worship of the sun will give rise to the worship of the true God, destroying the idols. The priests and doctors had schools in this city that depended on the temple dedicated to the cult of the sun.
Greek philosophers went there to study. In Herodotus’ time, the priests of On were the best historians in all of Egypt (Herodotus 2:3). Pharaoh gave Joseph the daughter of a priest of On as his wife (Gen. 41:45, 50; 46:20).