Vajrapani wears a tiger skin wrapped around his waist symbolizing fearlessness and virility.  When you look at the back of the statue you can see the head of the tiger.  His hands display the threatening mudra; he holds a vajra in his right hand (symbolizing the power of compassion) and a rope in his left with which he binds demons and delusion.  He is adorned  with a garland of snakes, the embodiment of anger, which he transforms, by the force of his great compassion.  He has a third eye of wisdom in the center of his forehead.  The artist has place this ferocious bodhisattva against the background of flaming auras.  Vajrapani wears a crown of five skulls symbolizing his mastery of the five wisdoms of Buddha.  There is also a vajra embedded on his topknot symbolizing his affiliation with the Vajrayana lineage.

Stories abound concerning the power of this bodhisattva, one of them is as follows: As the Bodhisattva disciple of Shakyamuni Buddha, many stories are told of the powerful means he used to promote and protect the teachings.  On one famous occasion Shakyamuni was seated at Gridhakuta Hill near Rajagriha, the site where he delivered the perfection of the Wisdom sutras.  At that time his jealous cousin Devadatta rolled a large boulder down the hill in an attempt to assassinate him.  Just as the huge stone was about to crush Buddha, Vajrapani used his immense powers to split it in two so that the pieces of the boulder fell harmlessly to either side.  In recognition of Vajrapani's powerful abilities, Shakyamuni entrusted him with the protection of the tantras.  As protector of these precious and esoteric teachings, Vajrapani is sometimes also referred to as the 'Lord of Secrets'.

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