Untouched magical temple soothes Japanese tsunami survivors

For many locals who come to worship here, the temple seems to have magical powers. The March 11 tsunami rushed up a slope to the steps of the temple grounds and then turned back, dragging thousands of people and buildings with it back into the ocean.

After that, an inferno of exploding fuel from canisters, cars and gasoline stations engulfed most of the town, where local officials said they can confirm the whereabouts of only about 6,400 of the town’s 15,000 residents.

Though flames leapt up the mountainside and scorched the trunks of trees encircling the temple grounds, the fire stopped before reaching the main wooden shrine — which has been periodically rebuilt, according to Shinto custom, for more than 1,000 years.

“No firemen came here to put out the flames. God was protecting the temple,” said Takaaki Goto, 74, a city councilor and former geography teacher who survived the tsunami that killed the mayor and 31 other town officials.

“I’ve heard people say that Japan is a country without God. But if you look around, you can see that God protected many things.”

The tsunami and fire gutted his new home across the street, but his most treasured possession — a small shrine containing the ashes and scrolls of his ancestors, who have been living in Otsuchi since the 17th century — survived.

Like Mr. Goto, many who lost their material possessions are turning to spirituality to comfort them in hard times.

On the other side of Otsuchi, the tsunami blew apart a 35-foot-high wall and obliterated the port, fish processing factories and hundreds of homes in the Ando district. The ocean, attacking in a series of three waves, grew to 50 feet in height, chasing about 130 people up a staircase to the hilltop Inari shrine.

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