This form inspires both fear and great respect because he is a blood-drinking deity of death and destruction. On the other hand, this deity can also bestow grace to alleviate suffering and sickness. In the city of Kathmandu, there are many forms of Phra Bhairava. Some are made of bronze and some of stone. Some are full statues and some depict only the head. He is usually depicted with bulging eyes, extended tongue and tusks. When Professor Mattani Rutnin went to India to research the art of dance, her archeologist friend bought a small three inch copper statue called a Phra Kan Bhairava. This is a dark and wrathful [tamasic] form of Śiva. And many artists and dancers worship him. In the Indian theogeny there are eight major types of Bhairavas. [i]

Phra Bhairava has a direct relationship to dance. This form originates a particular dance called Vichitra Tāṇḍava.[ii] This is a marvelous dance as it depicts the 108 gestures of Phra Śiva. As mentioned earlier, in India, Phra Bhairava is worshiped especially by artisans in association with sacred rivers, such as the Ganges, and rivers in the region of Orissa, such as the Mahanadi. This cult is especially strong in the region of Banaras [Varanasi]. The worship of this image protects from misfortune and bestows grace to cure illness. In the temple of Phra Suriyathep[iii] at Konark in the present state of Orissa there is a statue of Phra Bhairava which is very beautiful and elegant. It is mixture of Bhairava and Suriyathep. The name of this statue is Mārttāṇḍa-Bhairava. He is a deity of darkness and death. The rituals connected to this deity are always conducted after sunset. The name Mārttāṇḍa means sunset.[iv] His body is black and nude. He has three faces and has a third eye on the forehead. His mouth is in the form of a grimace-like smile and he has short blunt tusks. The mouth is in fact like our own image Phra Phirap. He wears a garland of skulls, and wears anklets and bracelets. He has six arms (but two are broken). In one of his right hands he holds a trident, in another he holds a lasso. And in another he holds a skull bowl [kapāla], which can hold either a poison or a cure, since he is the one to not only cause sickness and death but also provide cures and give life. In one left hand he holds small drum called a ban daw [damāru]. His dancing position represents a dance called the Silapa Sirahatta. This dance involves one leg bent and one leg raised. When I saw this dance I began to suspect that Phra Phirap is directly connected to Phra Bhairava and Phra Śiva Natarat [Naṭarāja, the famous dancing image of Śiva]. [v]

The person who dances the na phat, is not depicting the dance of a normal yak but the dance of a great deity, the same as the dance of the Phra Śiva Naṭarāja. It is not merely for purpose of artistic beauty, but also involves the more profound themes of life and death. This is evidence of the dark sacredness of the dance of Phra Phirap.

… Bhairava’s aspect has eight different forms, named Asitāṇga, Ruru, Chaṇḍa, Krōdha, Unmatta-Bhairava, Kāpāla, Bhīshaṇa and Saṁhāra. Each one of these forms is divided further into eight subordinate forms, thus making sixty-four in all.” (Rao, p. 180)

[ii] Ananda K. Coomaraswamy, in his famous essay “The Dance of Śiva”, writes:

The second well-known dance of Śiva is called the Tāṇḍava, and belongs to His tamasic aspect as Bhairava or Virabhadra. It is performed in cemeteries and burning grounds, where Śiva, usually in ten-armed form, dances wildly with Dēvī, accompanied by troops of capering imps… This tāṇḍava dance is in origin that of a pre-aryan divinity, half-god, half-demon, who holds his midnight revels in the burning ground. In later times, this dance in the cremation ground, sometimes of Śiva, sometimes of Dēvī, in interpreted in Śaiva and Śākta, literature in a most touching and profound sense. (Coomaraswamy, p. 57)

Alain Daniélou in his book Sacred Music: Its Origins, Powers, and Future, also draws connections  between Śiva and Dionysius. See pages 120-122.

[iii] This refers to Sūrya, the sun deity.

[iv] Rao lists this form as a subordinate form of Asitāṅga. See Rao, p. 180.

[v] Coomaraswamy supports this connection of the dance of Bhairava and Naṭarāja. He writes:

Śiva is a destroyer and loves the burning gound. But what does he destroy? Not merely the heavens and earth at the end of a kalpa, but the fetters that bind each separate soul. Where and what is the burning ground? It is not the place where our earthly bodies are cremated, but the heart of the bhakta, the devotee, laid waste and desolate. He brings not peace but a sword. The place where their selves are destroyed signifies the place or state where their egoity or illusion and deeds are burnt away: that is the crematorium, the burning-ground where Śrī Naṭarāja dances, and whence He is named Sudalaiyādi, Dancer of the burning-ground. In this simile, we recognize the historical connection between Śiva’s gracious dance as Naṭarāja, and His wild dance as the demon of the cemetery. (Coomaraswamy, p. 61)