He returned and continued doing exactly what he had done before. Investing tons of resources into new products that have cutting edge features bundled into an aesthetic package.
I don't know the story of Jobs well enough to pinpoint what had changed over the intervening years, but something clearly did change. He had and maintained the confidence of the company. He was able to restore confidence of the consumer. There was a clear succession plan when he passed away, avoiding the turmoil that Apple saw after his ousting in the 1980's. This was not the same man, even if he maintained his abrasive edge.
In the early 2000s, developers were building for the Internet and there were only two options for hosting: Windows NT and Solaris. The licensing for both was prohibitive (and just annoying) and so Linux/FreeBSD started getting traction on the server side. FreeBSD didn't have the hardware adoption so faded (but is still loved). Linux had enough hardware support to run serious servers but the desktop never was usable (the year of the Linux desktop!).
Having OS X being a UNIX-variant was 'close enough' to develop on Mac (a very usable desktop) and deploy on Linux.
Then, Windows released Vista which was so broken that developers simply had to move to Mac in order to be able to function.
That progression is why Mac went from almost dying to being the most valuable company on Earth.
Why do people still continue to spread this misconception?
Edit: Just to add, like many professional developers at the time, we were driven from Windows just as much as we were pulled in by OS X.
There was absolutely nothing godlike about Steve Jobs and I really wonder where this sort of weird worship originates.
I know plenty of stories about Jobs that put him in a very negative light no matter what the financial outcome.
Partly.
Instinctive hero worship tendencies in people?
A little.