Bethel, meaning 'House of El' or 'House of God' in Hebrew, Phoenician and Aramaic, was the name of a god or an aspect of a god in some ancient Middle Eastern texts dating to the Assyrian, Achaemenid, and Hellenistic periods.[1][2] The term appears in the Torah and the Christian Bible, but opinions differ as to whether those references are to a god or to a place.