"Certain lewd fellows of the baser sort" (Acts 17:5): sounds like a gang of sexually indecent men

Acts 17:5 describes jealous opponents in Thessalonica who "took unto them certain lewd fellows of the baser sort, and gathered a company, and set all the city on an uproar." A modern reader assumes "lewd" is about sexual misconduct, since that's the word's entire meaning now. But in 1611 English, "lewd" traced back to a word for the unlearned or common laity, and by Shakespeare's day it had broadened into a general put-down for anyone worthless, base, or morally low, with no sexual content required.

That's why modern translations render the phrase "wicked men from the marketplace" (CSB) or "some bad characters from the marketplace" (NIV), essentially rent-a-mob loiterers hired to stir up a riot, not a specific charge of sexual sin. The word's meaning has since narrowed hard toward sex, so the KJV phrase reads very differently today than it did to its original audience.