Religious tract asks: What's next for the iPod guy?

Though many look to His Steveness as some sort of cult leader (or in some more drastic, frightening cases, a deity of sorts), in a recent religious tract Jews for Jesus felt compelled to ask: What's next for the iPod guy? We think it's a little presumptuous a title for the tract -- which as far as we know is actual and real -- to assume he's one way or another when it comes to holiness since his 2004 bout with pancreatic cancer. (Jobs, as you might recall, was raised Lutheran but has long since been influenced by Eastern spirituality.) Besides the backward Apple logo (and their obvious oversight of the whole Garden of Eden implication), at least J4J got most of the basic details about Jobs' history down, including mention of the Reality Distortion Field (illustrated by beaming Jack Chick-inspired heavenly emanations), so you've at least got to hand these guys five points for creativity. Still, something tells us the only thing we can expect to see from the iPod guy in the near future is some biz on Leopard, and maybe some more info on the long-awaited Mac Pros.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

[mrkaiser @ Jul 14th 2006 7:06PM]

Check it Fool, work on the podcast! (I just kidding, but seriously podcasts.... f5 keeps getting hit, soon its just going to be a crushed button)

[Daniel Elmore @ Jul 14th 2006 7:12PM]

How about dropping Safari and contributing to the Mozilla Firefox foundation. Start by preinstalling FF on Macs, then pay your Safari dev. team to work for Mozilla. Hey, a guy can dream.

[duhwhat @ Jul 14th 2006 7:16PM]

uh, pancreatic cancer? you sure about that? that has a 15% 5 year survival rate even if operated on... so steve will most likely be dead by 2009

[duhwhat @ Jul 14th 2006 7:21PM]

oh, nevermind, it wasn't an adenocarcinoma. keep on pumping out yearly ipods well into 2020, steve!

[bliss @ Jul 14th 2006 7:38PM]

Hm, more publicity for jobs... nice

[Rosco @ Jul 14th 2006 7:46PM]

Too bad J4J is a cult...

http://www.rickross.com/reference/jews_for_jesus/jews_for_jesus7.html

[Will @ Jul 14th 2006 8:09PM]

Hilarious. But the best parts are "This Offer Not Limited to Steve Jobs" and the strangly effeminate look Buzz Lightyear has on his face.

[Beng M @ Jul 14th 2006 8:25PM]

Actually it is kind of innovative as compared to bland and ordinary tracts.

[Joe @ Jul 14th 2006 8:28PM]

i was the Ipod 6G to come out all ready
it better have a 60 or 80 GB

[emmzee @ Jul 14th 2006 8:59PM]

I have to admit that's pretty awesome.

[Oyarses @ Jul 14th 2006 9:52PM]

The Apple logo and the "think different" slogan is not about the Garden of Eden. Their original logo (Google it to see) is of Isaac Newton under the tree getting hit on the head with an Apple.

[Joshua Ballard @ Jul 14th 2006 10:03PM]

Ugh...The Rick Ross Institute, spare me.

He thinks my mother is a cult. As for Jews for Jesus...maybe a little over enthusiastic but thats about it.


As for the tract?

I personally think that it's a lame attempt at presenting the gospel of Jesus Christ, but at least they're doing it.

[Euangelion @ Jul 14th 2006 11:17PM]

Rosco,

Seriously, a 'cult?' You can keep that crazy fundie right opinion if you so desire. I'm familiar with that 'cult' and happen to know some fine, upstanding Presbyterian ministers who are J4J alumni. If your idea of a cult is any group that doesn't believe in your 'basics' and 'values' then you have sadly not opened your eyes to the beauty and the diversity of the Christian faith. No matter how hard you try, no matter how smart you think you are, no matter how spiritually gifted you think you might be, you will never get the gospel, the faith and the Trinity in that tiny box you call your 'fundamentalist' theology.

[jordan @ Jul 14th 2006 11:43PM]

"How about dropping Safari and contributing to the Mozilla Firefox foundation. Start by preinstalling FF on Macs, then pay your Safari dev. team to work for Mozilla. Hey, a guy can dream."
your an idiot. mostly because safari is good and firefox elitest are the worst kind.
(opera is better, and you can't tell me its not, and not lie)

[RiverCocytus @ Jul 15th 2006 12:44AM]

Um, can we pay to get some decent commenters? :P

1. There are some 'pseudo-Christian' cults, but to my awareness J4J is not one of them. That would be like saying that Intervarsity is a cult. To be a cult, one of the big things that must happen is that a person or idea replaces Jesus as the Word of God, or replaces God Himself.

2. Opera and Firefox are different. Opera is used less, so it is supported less among browsers (none of the websites I do, as a professional developer, do we support opera for...) and thus you are going to see visual glitches since Opera displays css/html differently than IE or Firefox. Clearly, what constitutes BETTER in a web browser is effected by what a particular person wants to use it for. For my purposes, Opera is useless. Pretty, but the worst thing I could be using.

As for Firefox elitism, seems like a straw man, just like the fundie comment from before. Let someone actually reveal a position before attacking them for it. After all, a supporter of Firefox could want any number of programmers working on FF instead of whatever without being elitist in the least.

Pen your mind, but mind your pen!

[LordJohnWhorfin @ Jul 15th 2006 1:30AM]

Jews For Jesus is not a cult... More like a bunch of crackpots pining for holiday spruce.

[Sredlums @ Jul 15th 2006 5:33AM]

Sigh.

I'm from The Netherlands so I never heard of JfJ, and though it is my belief (pun intended) that the world would be SO much better of without any religion, at least these guys seem to have some humor...
Now I think we can all agree that -even though they allway claim to have so much 'joy'- humor is not what strong believers in any religion are know for...

As for the religious flamers that are about to tell me I will burn in hell for eternity...I know, I know...oh, wait, I forgot...there is no such thing as hell. Or at least, so I think, for I would not want to be as arrogant as 'believers' are, by claiming to 'just know' something that I we simply can not have a clue about...

Pop-quiz for all the 'believers' who probably asume I am a bad person:
which person is 'better', the one who does the right things because he/she is told to do so by his religion on fear of burning in hell (or any other punishment the religion sees fit), or he/she who just does the right thing because, well, he/she feels it's the right thing to do?
There is no 'god', but if one existed he would like the second kind better I guess...

[solomonrex @ Jul 15th 2006 10:49AM]

Hello Sredlums: I think a person who does the right thing without 'fear' wouldn't be so insecure to pick on strangers for their beliefs.

Studies show that people who believe in Hell actually are more likely to tell the truth. They actually have an incentive to do the right thing when they have no selfish reason to do so. So I think God cares about results, Sredlums, and not the nebulous idea of motivation.

[EatingPie @ Jul 15th 2006 11:02AM]

Good comment on the humor. There is actually humor in the Bible, but it's difficult to see because the style so different than modern writing.

I will counter that there indeed IS a God, and it's a logcal imperative hardwired into our universe and our lives (no, I'm not talking about "creationism" with this statement). But you are correct in that God does not want us "doing right" simply because it's a religious rule... that turns is into a Clockwork Orange.

Christianity in particular is about a desire to be with God, not about rules and regulations, nor even about "doing the right thing" per se. Yes, doing what's right is important, but that flows from -- comes as a consequence of -- our desire to seek and be with God, accomplished through Christ. (Surprised? Yeah, believe it or not, politics has nothing to do with it! :) )

BTW, loved the tract. It WAS funny!

-Pie

[BowlHaircut @ Jul 15th 2006 11:05AM]

In case anyone was wondering, this is definitely legit, it's hosted on the website found in the tract. Here's a link to download the tract off their site:
http://www.jesusforjews.org/files/pamphlets/Whats_Next_IPod_Guy%20_R.pdf

These guys are definitely creative with their tracts. I guess Bill Gates gets the month off from being cast down to hell for announcing his retirement to cure every disease known to man.

[EatingPie @ Jul 15th 2006 11:57AM]

solomonrex -

I hate to say but your comment is almost entirely wrong. In particular...

>> They actually have an incentive to do the right
>> thing when they have no selfish reason to do so.
>> So I think God cares about results, Sredlums,
>> and not the nebulous idea of motivation."

First off, incentive in this case (ie not going to Hell) IS a selfish reason!

Most importantly, motivation indeed DOES matter. The heart outweighs the action. Christ himself gave examples of this (committing lust in your heart, even if you don't commit adultry).

This "nebulous idea of motivation" -- the heart -- is actually where the rubber meets the road in Christianity.

You can be a Christian, do all the "right things," but only be in it as a form of fire insurance -- not caring about God or Christ in the end. In this case, being a Christian doesn't matter at all because your motivation for doing so was wrong.

-Pie

[Bob @ Jul 15th 2006 12:10PM]

Something is very wrong here... Are they trying to convert steve jobs? this is one of those things that lewis black talks about, the moments where the left side of your brain looks to the right side and says "it's dark in here, and we may die." But in all seriousness this is disgusting, i respect every religions right to exist, but don't try to convert other people. Jews for Jesus is just a way to trick jewish people into christianity which is horrible. And back to my other point, its frankly rude to try and convert other people, I'm a jew and one time my christian cousin tried to convert me. So this is a plea saying, please respect peoples right to be whatever religion they want. You don't have to physically force someone to be a religion make them convert.

[Bob @ Jul 15th 2006 12:32PM]

And by the way "The Interfaith Conference of Metropolitan Washington, an umbrella organization that includes Roman Catholic, Methodist, Baptist, Lutheran and Presbyterian church groups, has condemned Jews for Jesus as promoting activities "harmful to the spirit of interreligious respect and tolerance." - from wikipedia

[emmzee @ Jul 15th 2006 5:43PM]

Bob said: "Jews for Jesus is just a way to trick jewish people into christianity which is horrible. And back to my other point, its frankly rude to try and convert other people, I'm a jew and one time my christian cousin tried to convert me."

Jews for Jesus is an organization consisting predominantly of Jews who believe that Jesus is the Messiah. They're not trying to "trick" anyone of anything, they are trying to convince people of who Jesus is.

Let me just propose this ... if someone really believes 'X' (ex. Judaism, Christianity, Buddhism, etc) but they don't try to share this truth (which is ultimately at least a very important truth) with anyone, would that make them a bad (or at least selfish) person? I would say yes. Trying to force beliefs on others is of course unacceptable, but what's wrong with sharing faith in a non-threatening way like this pamphlet?

Remember, its possible that all religions are false, but not possible that all are true.

[noname989 @ Jul 15th 2006 6:44PM]

"Remember, its possible that all religions are false, but not possible that all are true."

It's this "There can only be one" attitude which causes much suffering. Theres a thin line between "sharing" and "forcing".

[Daniel @ Jul 15th 2006 7:36PM]

I knew Steve was a jew! Baruch Hashem! If he is descendent form King David, he may even be the Mashich hiself! What a blessing for us Jew-macheads. Can't wait for the keynote when he announces iTemple 3.0 !

[Bill @ Jul 15th 2006 8:03PM]

"It's this "There can only be one" attitude which causes much suffering."

A review of boolean logic will reveal that that emzee is not saying there is only one way.

[blah @ Jul 15th 2006 9:56PM]

"including mention of the Reality Distortion Field (illustrated by beaming Jack Chick-inspired heavenly emanations)"

actually, that's just a sketch of a picture taken in photo booth using the light tunnel effect of a well known pic of his steveness.

[Davar @ Jul 15th 2006 11:15PM]

When speaking of Job's eastern spirituality, which fundamentally agrees with the historically trustworthy Chritianity of the 1st century including all the faithful's belief in the reality of God becoming man so that man can become godlike in his character and in his humble yielding to God THE HOLY SPIRIT, become energized to be who he was meant to be, a child of the Eternal God :-)! Check out www.orthodoxinfo.com/inquirers/ or http://www.monachos.net/patristics/sources.shtml :-)

[Davar @ Jul 15th 2006 11:17PM]

About Jews for Jesus: All the Apostles and Majority of the Prophets post Christ's Resurrection were all Jews for Jesus :-) who later were called Christians :-)

[Bob @ Jul 16th 2006 1:02AM]

"if someone really believes 'X' (ex. Judaism, Christianity, Buddhism, etc) but they don't try to share this truth (which is ultimately at least a very important truth) with anyone, would that make them a bad (or at least selfish) person? I would say yes. Trying to force beliefs on others is of course unacceptable, but what's wrong with sharing faith in a non-threatening way like this pamphlet?"

First of all what makes one religion right? why should an 'x' say "I've got it, this is right, lets 'help' the others." what makes him or her right. prove that theres god, or heaven, or hell. If you can't do this then feel free to say your christion, or jewish, or muslim, or any religion but don't say "jews for jesus" (this is incorrect because jews belive there messiah hasn't arrived yet so saying that your jewish and you belive jesus is the messiah is saying your christian). Also this pamphlet was a stunt and it worked. The chances the people who started this are thinking they can convert steve jobs are very low. But hey its on Engadget so mission accomplished. And lastly, do you have any clue what your talking about? this isn't to be rude but saying doesn't make since

"Jews for Jesus is an organization consisting predominantly of Jews who believe that Jesus is the Messiah. They're not trying to "trick" anyone of anything, they are trying to convince people of who Jesus is."

like i said before you can't be jewish and believe jesus is the messiah, if you say that then you are christian. And they are trying to trick people, people who say they are jewish and don't practice and life may not be going great, maybe read "the davinci code" and say "man chritianity is bad" then see a sign saying jews for jesus and think that they can be jewish and get jesus to "save" them. If this isn't good enough an explantion for you then i'll sum it up. They are targeting people who say judism isn't working but don't want to convert and they ARE tricking them by saying you can still be jewish and worship jesus. So please research before you speak, maybe read a book or two.

[daniel @ Jul 16th 2006 2:41AM]

Bob,

I don't agree with you. It is possible to be jewish and belive in jesus. You shoud not call them christians you should call them reform.

If you are a jew who is not following those 613 "hints" G'd sent us - you are following jesus!

The only logical thing for a reform jew is to belive in jesus, as only he, the holly mamzer, has the proper justification for not following the Tora. After all, he got us some messages from his father... (who ever he is...)

[EatingPie @ Jul 16th 2006 4:26AM]

"First of all what makes one religion right? why should an 'x' say "I've got it, this is right, lets 'help' the others." what makes him or her right. prove that theres god, or heaven, or hell."

Bob.

Good question. What does make one religion right? The answer is simple: it's up to you to decide.

But why would this preclude someone telling you about their beliefs? It's how the world works, we share our experiences and beliefs. Even if someone is trying to convince you, they cannot "force" their religion on you (or anyone for that matter). You make your own choices, form your own beliefs, nobody does it for you.

-Pie

[Brad Rhoads @ Jul 16th 2006 8:30AM]

Hi Everyone,

If anyone is seriously investigating the claims of Christianty, these books may be useful:

The Case For Christ by Lee Stroble
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0310209307/sr=8-1/qid=1153052098/ref=pd_bbs_1/002-2731529-8387269?ie=UTF8

The Case For Faith by Lee Stroble
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0310234697/ref=pd_sim_b_1/002-2731529-8387269?%5Fencoding=UTF8&v=glance&n=283155

You can also send me any questions you might have.

-Brad
bradrhoads (at) hotmail.com

[Sredlums @ Jul 16th 2006 2:48PM]

Sigh again.

Hearing all the believers say that they are SURE their religioun is the right one is SO stupid.
They way the world treats religioun is even more stupid.
Let's simplify things a bit and to get a clearer view of things;
Say there's 10 people in a room. Now there is a rumor that there's an unknown object in the room next to it.
Then the first person says he's SURE it's big, red, and heavy. The second says he is SURE it's small, blue, and weighs almost nothing. Third one says he's SURE it's red indeed, but small, and it weighs even more then the first one claims. Al the other persons claim to know to be SURE what the object is too, and they all have a different discription.
Now we can't call them liars, because one of them COULD be right. On the other hand, nobody knows if there IS an object to begin with, let alone what it looks like.
So though we can't be sure that they are wrong, should we just believe them??
Or even more important, should we even allow someone to claim they are SURE of something, even though we know there is NO WAY of knowing something for sure??

I think everyone with a working brain awould agree that we should not believe them, and should not let them say they are SURE.
Ofcourse it is acceptable if they want to say that they think/feel/sence/believe/assume/hope something to be true.

Yet, how do we treat the same situation when it comes to religions?
We let them say they are SURE, we let them raise children with these thoughts and thereby let them lie to their children (like in the simplified example, it is most probable that it is a lie, they raise people with all kinds of believes as if it is the one and only truth, yet only one can possibly be true).
We put 'In God We Trust' on our money.
We let people start WARS and kill people over religions for heaven's sake (pun intended).

I live in The Netherlands, and we are very liberal here, but even here it is really bad. I was baptised when I was a baby, so officially I am a 'believer' in a religion, yet I don't believe in ANY religion.
How can it be acceptable that we let parents lay their truth upon babies, and let them tell things that are probably lies?

It's only logical to raise a child based upon your own way of living and thinking, but shoulden't we be teaching them as many views as possible, and have them decide FOR THEMSELVES what and if they want to believe, when they have the age, information and wisdom to make this choice???

Can anybody explain me why we don't treat religion with the same logic and common sence then we do with other important things?

@solomonrex: you say "Hello Sredlums: I think a person who does the right thing without 'fear' wouldn't be so insecure to pick on strangers for their beliefs."
Well, what exactly makes you asume I am insecure?
I don't feel insecure, thanx, at least not any more then every normal person surly feels sometimes. For example, religion is one thing I don't and CAN'T know enough about to claim that I am sure of it. Like I said in my post I don't KNOW if there is a god, I only said I find it VERY unlikely.
But if you want to think I am insecure then that's fine by me.
What I do find VERY irritating is that you accuse me of 'picking on strangers'...
Excuse me, but do you have ANY idea how much of far more intense 'picking' a non-believer like me has to endure from all kinds of believers in all kinds of religions!?!?
All I said is that you believers are probably wrong.
What I hear from believers is that I am a bad person, that I am a fool, that I am living my life all wrong, and that I will burn in hell...
If you feel I am picking on people then that is your judgement, but then at least acknowledge that I'm not the only one doing the picking...

@eatingpie: you said "First off, incentive in this case (ie not going to Hell) IS a selfish reason!" and "You can be a Christian, do all the "right things," but only be in it as a form of fire insurance -- not caring about God or Christ in the end."
Couldn't agree with you more!
You also say "Good question. What does make one religion right? The answer is simple: it's up to you to decide."
Don't agree there; it's not up to anyone to decide what religion is right. A religion is simply true or not. And since there is as of yet no way of telling wich one is true, if any, nobody should be allowed to tell me about their religion as 'the truth'. It IS ofcourse up to you to decide what religion feels right, live by that, and tell others why it feels so right to you.

@emmzee: you said "Trying to force beliefs on others is of course unacceptable, but what's wrong with sharing faith in a non-threatening way like this pamphlet?"
Well, the fact that believers tend to bring it as the absolute truth is what's wrong with it!

Please feel free to respond, because it is not my intention to insult or be arrogant, I just really don't get why we treat religion the way we do. Please let me hear your opinions!

[jesusfreak @ Jul 16th 2006 2:50PM]

wow...i never thought so many christians visited engadget!!! rock on...Eating Pie, i agree with everything you said...

i have read the case for christ, another good book along those lines, is Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis

anyway, i think this tract is geared to those followers of the cult of mac (i think those people over at macdailynews fit the bill lol)

-God bless :)

[exfundie @ Jul 16th 2006 4:17PM]

I started reading Mere Christianity once on the recommendation of a friend but stopped about a thrid of the way through because it was so full of logical holes.

Solomonrex, you said:

> Studies show that people who believe in Hell actually are more likely to tell the truth.

Do you have a reference for those studies? I have to believe the surveys didn't include Jim Bakker, Jimmy Swigart, Kent Hovind, Pat Robertson, etc.

[EatingPie @ Jul 16th 2006 10:59PM]

Hello again Sredlums, and thanks for addressing my statements.

You are right in searching for the truth, and indeed I played it a bit too fast and loose in my post. Let me clarify.

In anything we do, we look at evidence and decide what is true or false for ourselves. We may be right or wrong -- seeing the real reality or not -- but ultimately our worldview shapes is shaped by these beliefs. I'm drawing a similarity with religion. You look at the evidence and decide for yourself what to believe. I went this way because of the comments on "forcing" someone to believe in your religion (an impossibility IMHO).

But, as you say, that's not an entirely accurate answer.

There is belief, and there is TRUTH. I do agree with you: a religion is true or false (one caveat: I think seeds of truth exist in religions that are not true, but that's a different discussion!).

But how do we get to the truth? To ANY truth? For brevity, I'm going to ignore the philosophical dilemmas implied here.

In science, we look at evidence, take observations, apply the tools of logic and reason (the two imperatives of science), and even sometimes filter them through our beliefs (oops, said I was going to ignore the dilemma). These are the only tools we use to find the truth.

Why do you think God is any different? To get to the truth, you need to apply the tools of science -- more accurately, philosophy since it's meta-physical rather than physical.

Take a religion, look at its tenets. Do they make sense? Are they consistent with themselves? Are the consistent with the world? Do they accurately explain humanity? Is there evidence supporting the tenets? Etc., Etc.

Works for science. Works for religion too.

Oh, and there's a TON more I could say here in regards to "TRUTH" but I'm leaving it off... ;)

-Pie