Gematria (gheh-MAY-tree-uh) is an ancient system of coding letters into numbers. 

Jewish mystics (Kabbalah) look at numerical patterns to find deeper meaning and relationships between words and names.

In Hebrew (and in Greek) the letters are the same as the numerals so this is a fairly natural connection.

If it was English we would take A=1, B=2, C=3... so the word CAT would be 3+1+20=24

If there is another 24 word that connects to cat, then this would be a way to think of these words together. (For example FLEA 6+12+5+1=24)

Of course there are some funny coincidences. But if combining CAT and FLEA is meaningful to you, then gematria is a way to reinforce that combination.

I am mostly interested in Hebrew gematria because it is a Jewish tradition and the texts come from the Old Testament. I am also interested in Greek gematria (called isopsephy) because the New Testament was written in Greek