"If we have dozens of references that say the Christ myth theory is the position that Jesus was an entirely fictional or mythological character created by the early Christian community, why are we trying to change the lead sentence, which is probably the clearest thing in the entire article? We know that the majority of sources that use the phrase ""Christ myth theory"" define it this way, and the sources that talk about the line of thought espoused by Bauer-Drews-Wells say that these men argued that there was no historical Jesus. So let's not muddy things up unnecessarily. 

 The bullet points that Bruce has above all share the idea that there was no historical Jesus. (1) ""Jesus was an entirely fictional or mythological character created by the Early Christian community""—obvious enough. (2) ""Jesus started out as a myth with historical trappings added later""—well, all this means is that Jesus was a mythological character created by the Christians, and as time went by, they tried to make him look more historical. Doesn't conflict with #1, and I thought this was a position adopted by some of the people discussed in this article—for instance, Paul conceives of Jesus as entirely a supernatural, spiritual being, and it's only in the Gospels that there are attempts to make him a person who appeared in a definite time and place. (3) ""Jesus was historical but lived c100 BCE""—this isn't the historical Jesus, this is a different guy. On any standard reconstruction the historical Jesus lives in the first third of the 1st century CE (unless you think he outlived the crucifixion or something). Note that in the reference Bruce gives, p. 65 of Price's contribution to The Historical Jesus: Five Views, Price names both ""the early G. A. Wells"" and Alvar Ellegard as authors who hold this view. Wells has clearly stated that in his early work he denied that there was a historical Jesus, so this position is clearly not in conflict with the idea that there was no historical Jesus. The basic idea is ""the New Testament is not based on the life of the historical Jesus, but a different person who lived in a much earlier time."" (4) ""The Gospel Jesus is in essence a composite character and therefore non historical by definition."" Ok, well, this doesn't conflict with the idea that there was no historical Jesus either, does it? The source Bruce gives for this view is Robert M. Price, so this point blends in with (5) There is not enough to show Jesus existed (Jesus Agnosticism), of which Price is an example. I don't think this fully represents what Boyd/Eddy are saying, because they lump this in with the non-historical position of Bauer, Drews, and Wells—the difference with Price is that he says it's more likely that there was no historical Jesus; he is, in other words, still very much in the CMT camp, but he's using the language of probability rather than certainty. (6) the gospel Jesus didn't exist. Bruce gives Doherty as a source for this, but unless I've misunderstood what Doherty has written on his website about his advocacy of ""the non-existence of an historical Jesus of Nazareth"", his position is not best summed up as ""the gospel Jesus didn't exist."" Rather, it's, well, ""Jesus was an entirely fictional or mythological character..."" And sure, there's probably more to what Doherty says, but he shares common ground with the other authors covered in this article, in that they all argue that the historical Jesus didn't exist (or, if you want, that it's more likely than not that he didn't exist). 

 Just to be clear, I think that the lead, and perhaps many sections of the article, don't do a great job of explaining the CMT to the reader. Bruce has raised some matters that need to be more clearly covered in the article. But the bullet points in his post above don't provide support for altering the basic definition of the article. 

 Also, we have so many sources that say that Drews argued there was no historical Jesus (even Weaver, whom Bruce mentions, said that ""Drews would become the most notorious spokesman for the deniers of Jesus' historicity"" (p. 49), that we shouldn't soften this characterization based on an editor's reading of Drews himself.   (