THE DURATION OF A PERFECT YEAR

Tradition has it that a Platonic year lasts 36,000 solar years. This number is based on Hipparchus' estimation of the precession of the equinoxes as quoted by Ptolemy in the Syntaxis. According to this theory, the equinoxes occur slightly earlier each year because of the gravitational force of the sun, the moon, and the planets on the earth's orbit. It is believed that the equinoxes shift a single degree every one hundred years. Thus, the equinoxes require 36,000 years to make a complete rotation of 360 degrees. (Dicks, pp.132-3)