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Case file

Sultan al-Wa'izin Shirazi

Wikipedia's first sentence called it “shi'a scholar portrayed in the book peshawar nights”. Today it says “prominent shi'a scholar”. The one-line description Wikipedia serves to search engines and AI systems read “Seyed Mohammad Shirazi (12 May 1894 – 11 October 1971), commonly known as”. It now reads “Iranian Ayatollah (1894–1971) Seyed Mohammad Shirazi (12 May 1894 – 11 October 1971), commonly known as”.
Measured, not asserted. Every count, date and revision on this page was taken from Wikipedia's own history and checked against the live article. The words quoted are theirs.
Machine-checked against the full current article on 2026-08-03.
We saved snapshots of this article over twenty years; you are reading the October 6, 2023 one. Red dashes: removed from Wikipedia since. Pale dots: rewritten; the numbered note shows what it says now. 1 tap a number or a side note to jump between them
The opening as it read in October 6, 2023

Iranian Ayatollah (1894–1971) Seyed Mohammad Shirazi (12 May 1894 – 11 October 1971), commonly known as Sultan al-Wa'izin Shirazi ("Prince of Preachers from Shiraz "), was a prominent Shi'a scholar. He authored Peshawar Nights , an account of a public debate between Shi'a and Sunni Muslims which took place in Peshawar over 10 nights beginning on 27 January 1927 Sultanu l-Wa'izin Shirazi was born in Tehran on 12 May 1894. After his primary school in Tehran, he moved with his father to Karbala and studied in some Hawzas .

This is Wikipedia's own text, saved in our repository. Their copy of it is revision 1146310091.
Today
Wikipedia's first sentence called it “shi'a scholar portrayed in the book peshawar nights”. Today it says “prominent shi'a scholar”. The one-line description Wikipedia serves to search engines and AI systems read “Seyed Mohammad Shirazi (12 May 1894 – 11 October 1971), commonly known as”. It now reads “Iranian Ayatollah (1894–1971) Seyed Mohammad Shirazi (12 May 1894 – 11 October 1971), commonly known as”. Read the current article and compare.
201020152020Oct '232025
Counts in the opening at each snapshot. Green: the word gained ground. Red: it was cut. Grey: no change.

What Wikipedia says this is

Every article opens by defining its subject. This one was redefined since 2010, and today's defining sentence is their current revision.

Then

shi'a scholar portrayed in the book peshawar nights

Now

prominent shi'a scholar

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.

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