OMEGA (f2), the last letter of the Greek alpha bet, proverbially applied to express the end, as Alpha (A), the first letter, the beginning of any thing. [ALPHA.] UMR1 ("I1]1.7, Sept. 'Ail(zipt), sixth king of Israel, who began to reign in B.C. 929, and reigned twelve years. He was raised to the throne by the army, while it was engaged in the siege of Gibbethon, a Levitical city in Dan, of which the Philistines had gained possession, when the news came to the camp of the death of Elah, and the usurpation of Zimri. On this, the army proclaimed their general, Omri, king of Israel. He then lost not a moment, but leaving Gibbethon in the power of the infidels, went and besieged his competitor in Tirzah. But he was no sooner de livered of this rival [Z1mR1], than another appeared in the person of Tibni, whom a part of the people had raised to the throne, probably from unwilling ness to submit to military dictation. This occa sioned a civil war, which lasted six years, and left Omri undisputed master of the throne. His reign lasted six years more, and its chief event was the foundation of Samaria, which thenceforth became the capital city of the kingdom of Israel (1 Kings xvi. i5-28). [SANTARIA.] [In order to harmonize the chronological data of his reign given i Kings xvi. 13, 23, 29, we may suppose that the twenty seventh year of Asa (923 B. c.) was the year of his accession to the throne ; the thirty-first of Asa the year of his peaceable occupation after the defeat of Tibni ; and by adding eleven years for his reign (for the twelve mentioned ver. 23 were not com plete years), we are brought to the thirty-eighth year of Asa as the year of Omri's death (917-9zS B.C.) Usser. Annall, p. 37.] ON (rIN, strength ; Sept. ACv), a chief of the tribe of Reuben, who was one of the accomplices of Korah in the revolt against the authority of Moses and Aaron. He is mentioned among the leaders of this conspiracy in the first instance (Num. xvi. 1), but does not appear in any of the subsequent transactions, and is not by name in cluded in the final punishment. The Rabbinical tradition is, that the wife of On persuaded her husband to abandon the enterprise.
ON (11N ; Sept. lacourr6Xes), one of the oldest cities in the world, situated in Lower Egypt, about two hours N.N.E. from Cairo. The Septuagint translates the name On by I Ieliopolis, which signifies `city of the sun ;' and in Jer. xliii. 13, it bears a name, Beth-shemesh (oppidum solis, Pliny, ilia'. Nat. v. I I), of equivalent import. On is a Coptic and ancient Egyptian word, signifying light and the sun (Ritter, Erdk. i. 822). The site is now marked by low mounds, enclosing a space about three-quarters of a mile in length by half a mile in breadth, which was once occupied by houses and by the celebrated Temple of the Sun. This area is at present a ploughed field, a garden of herbs; and the solitary obelisk which still rises in the midst of it is the sole remnant of the former splendours of the place. In the days of Edrisi and Abdallatif the place bore the name of Ain Shems ; and in the neighbouring village, Matariyeh, is still shown an ancient well bearing the same name. Near by it is a very old sycamore, its trunk straggling and gnarled, under which legendary tradition relates that the holy family once rested (Robinson's Bibli cal Researches, i. 36). Heliopolis was the capital of a district or nomos bearing the same name (Plin. Mist. Nat. v. 9 ; Ptolem. iv. 5).
The place is mentioned in Gen. xli. 45, where it is said that Pharaoh gave to Joseph a wife, Asenath, the daughter of Poti-pherah, priest of On (ver. so). From the passage in Jeremiah (ut supra), it may be inferred that it was distinguished for idolatrous worship : Ile shall break also the images of Beth shemesh that is in the land of Egypt, and the houses of the gods of the Egyptians shall he bum with fire.' The names, City of the Sun,"Temples of the Sun,' connected with the place, taken in conjunc tion with the words just cited from the prophet, seem to refer the mind to the purer form of worship which prevailed at a very early period in Egypt— namely, the worship of the heavenly bodies—and thence to carry the thoughts to the deteriorations which it afterwards underwent in sinking to the adoration of images and animals.