''To me it is the greatest miracle in life,'' said Hambo Lama Ayusheyev, the spiritual leader since 1995. ''It turns out there are things on which time has no power.''

The 12th Hambo Lama was born in 1852 in Czarist Russia and orphaned early, according to the Buddhists' history. At 16 he studied to become a lama and served in several monasteries in Buryatia. In 1911 he was nominated along with nine other candidates to become the Hambo Lama and he was ultimately appointed by the czar's governor in Irkutsk.

During his time as Hambo Lama, Itigilov is said to have strengthened the faith, especially among the Buryats, a nomadic people of Mongol descent who have lived in the region for more than 30 centuries. He published religious tracts and teachings and united many of the religion's factions.

Most of Russia's Buddhists -- estimated today at one million -- adhere to the ''yellow hat'' sect that is predominant in Tibet. The Dalai Lama is their highest spiritual leader.

In the years since the Soviet collapse, Buryatia has remained a republic of the Russian Federation. Across Russia the Buddhists have begun to thrive again, rebuilding lost temples, opening schools and attracting new followers, even among ethnic Russians.

The Ivolginsk monastery is Russia's Lhasa, attracting hundreds of believers a day to its temples and monuments. Hambo Lama Ayusheyev said he had not yet decided what to do with Itigilov's body, but others say it will become a relic that will attract still more visitors.

In Moscow, Vladislav L. Kozeltsev, an expert at the Center for Biomedical Technologies, the institute that keeps the body of Lenin -- who died in 1924 -- in state on Red Square, said the salt in the coffin might have slowed the decay but could not alone explain the preservation of the lama's body.