Birkhoff's theorem (relativity)

General relativity
${\displaystyle G_{\mu \nu }+\Lambda g_{\mu \nu }={\kappa }T_{\mu \nu }}$
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In general relativity, Birkhoff's theorem states that any spherically symmetric solution of the vacuum field equations must be static and asymptotically flat. This means that the exterior solution (i.e. the spacetime outside of a spherical, nonrotating, gravitating body) must be given by the Schwarzschild metric. The converse of the theorem is true and is called Israel's theorem.^[1][2] The converse is not true in Newtonian gravity.^[3][4]

The theorem was proven in 1923 by George David Birkhoff (author of another famous Birkhoff theorem, the pointwise ergodic theorem which lies at the foundation of ergodic theory). In 2005, Nils Voje Johansen, Finn Ravndal, Stanley Deser^{[citation needed]} stated that the theorem was allegedly published two years earlier by a little-known Norwegian physicist, Jørg Tofte Jebsen.^{[5][6][non-primary source needed][original research?]}