Flames

Flames is a term applied by H. P. Blavatsky in different ways. When used in a general sense, "The Flames, or 'Fires', represent Spirit, or the male element, and 'Water', matter, or the opposite element".

The term is also used in relation to the principles in human beings:

Man needs four flames and three fires to become one on Earth, and he requires the essence of the forty-nine fires§ to be perfect. (§ The “Three Fires,” Pavaka, Pavamâna, and Suchi, who had forty-five sons, who, with their three fathers and their Father Agni, constitute the 49 fires. Pavamâna (fire produced by friction) is the parent of the fire of the Asuras; Suchi (Solar fire) is the parent of the fire of the gods; and Pavaka (electric fire) is the father of the fire of the Pitris (See Vâyu Purâna.) But this is an explanation on the material and the terrestrial plane. The flames are evanescent and only periodical; the fires—eternal in their triple unity. They correspond to the four lower, and the three higher human principles.

However, this term is most frequently applied in The Secret Doctrine to refer to a hierarchy of celestial beings. Stanza II.8 says:

The flames came. The fires with the sparks; the night fires and the day fires. They dried out the turbid dark waters. With their heat they quenched them. The Lhas of the High, the Lhamayin of below, came. They slew the forms which were two- and four-faced. They fought the goat-men, and the dog-headed men, and the men with fishes’ bodies.

Mme. Blavatsky explains the Stanza as follows:

The “Flames” are a Hierarchy of Spirits parallel to, if not identical with, the “burning” fiery Saraph (Seraphim) mentioned by Isaiah (vi. 2—6), those who attend, according to Hebrew Theogony, “the Throne of the Almighty.” Melha is the Lord of the “Flames.” When he appears on Earth, he assumes the personality of a Buddha,” says a popular legend. He is one of the most ancient and revered Lhas, a Buddhist St. Michael.

The Devas (gods) called Archis, the “Flames,” or Fiery Angels, answering to the Christian archangels.

The phenomenon of light is said to be related to these beings:

Our physical light is the manifestation on our plane and the reflected radiance of the Divine Light emanating from the collective body of those who are called the “LIGHTS” and the “FLAMES.”

Finally, "The Flames" refer to the the gods that incarnated to help the evolution of humanity:

Nor have the semi-esoteric dogmas of Purânic Hinduism failed to evolve very suggestive symbols and allegories concerning the rebellious and fallen gods. The Purânas teem with them; and we find a direct hint at the truth in the frequent allusions of Parâsara (Vishnu Purâna), to all those Rudras, Rishis, Asuras, Kumâras and Munis, having to be born in every age, to re-incarnate in every Manvantara. This (esoterically) is equivalent to saying that the FLAMES born of the Universal Mind (Mahat), owing to the mysterious workings of Karmic Will and an impulse of Evolutionary Law, had, as in Pymander—without any gradual transition—landed on this Earth, having broken through the seven Circles of fire, or the seven intermediate Worlds, in short.