Case file
Lawrence Schiffman
Wikipedia's first sentence called it “ethel and irvin a”. Today it says “professor at new york university”.
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Machine-checked against the full current article on 2026-08-03.
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The opening as it read in 2005
He is a scholar in the field of Dead Sea Scrolls research.1 His major interests are Dead Sea Scrolls; Jewish religious, political, and social history in late antiquity; the history of Jewish law and Talmudic literature.2 As an Orthodox Jew , Dr. Schiffman brings an Orthodox perspective to the field of Judaic studies, for example, as an Orthodox Jew he takes seriously the Talmud 's description of the Sadducees and applies this to his understanding of the Qumran sect as a renegade band of Sadducee separatists rather than as Essenes , a totally unrelated sect.3
This is Wikipedia's own text, saved in our repository. Their copy of it is revision 17530419.
Today
Wikipedia's first sentence called it “ethel and irvin a”. Today it says “professor at new york university”. Read the current article and compare.
| 2005 | 2010 | 2015 | 2020 | Oct '23 | 2025 |
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What Wikipedia says this is
Every article opens by defining its subject. This one was redefined since 2005, and today's defining sentence is their current revision.
Then
ethel and irvin a
Now
professor at new york university
Struck red text is no longer in the article; dotted amber text was rewritten. Every revision id links to Wikipedia's copy; the text shown is our own saved copy. Data: /data. Wikipedia text is CC BY-SA; quoted for the record; not affiliated with Wikipedia.