Don't overrate the Talmud. (2012)

I spent 12 years trying to study the Talmud and though I found some jewels, most of the stuff I read is silly, superstitious or plain nasty.

I remember when I tried to explain to my then 12-year daughter the treaty Yevamot (which starts the order "Nashim" (women)). After listening to me for 30 minutes she said: "These initially were private jokes between pals and following generations began to take them seriously and think there was some great-hidden knowledge in them."

Some silly and superstitious stuff you may find in the Talmud:

About cut nails (Moed Katan 18a) : "Three things were said in reference to nails: One who buries them is righteous; one who burns them is pious and one who throws them away is a villain’! What is the reason? Lest a pregnant woman should step over them and miscarry"

Some exaggerations (Baba Bathra 73b):

Rabbah said: I saw an antelope. one day old, that was as big as Mount Tabor. (How big is Mount Tabor? — Four parasangs. [1 Parasang= 6 Km]).The length of its neck was three parasangs and the resting place of its head was one parasang and a half. It cast a ball of excrement and blocked up the Jordan.

Rabbah b. Bar Hana further stated: I saw a frog the size  of the Fort of Hagronia. (What is the size of the Fort of Hagronia? — Sixty houses.) There came a snake and swallowed the frog. Then came a raven and swallowed the snake, and perched on a tree. Imagine how strong was the tree. R. Papa b. Samuel said: Had I not been there I would not have believed it.

Rabbah b. Bar Hana further stated: Once we were traveling onboard a ship and saw a fish in whose nostrils a parasite had entered. Thereupon, the water cast up the fish and threw it upon the shore. Sixty towns were destroyed thereby, sixty towns ate therefrom, and sixty towns salted [the remnants] thereof, and from one of its eyeballs three hundred kegs of oil were filled. On returning after twelve calendar months  we saw that they were cutting rafters from its skeleton and proceeding to rebuild those towns.

Rabbah b. Bar Hana further stated: Once we were traveling onboard a ship and saw a fish whose back was covered with sand out of which grew grass. Thinking it was dry land14  we went up and baked, and cooked, upon its back. When, however, its back was heated it turned, and had not the ship been nearby we should have been drowned.

Rabbah b. Bar Hana further stated: We traveled once onboard a ship. and the ship sailed between one fin of the fish and the other for three days and three nights; it [swimming] upwards and we [floating] downwards.  And if you think the ship did not sail fast enough, R. Dimi, when he came, stated that it covered sixty parasangs in the time it takes to warm a kettle of water. When a horseman shot an arrow [the ship] outstripped it. And R. Ashi said: That was one of the small sea monsters which have [only] two fins.

Rabbah b. Bar Hana further related: Once we traveled on board a ship and we saw a bird standing up to its ankles in the water while its head reached the sky. We thought the water was not deep  and wished to go down to cool ourselves, but a Bath Kol  called out: 'Do not go down here for a carpenter's axe was dropped [into this water] seven years ago and it has not [yet] reached the bottom. And this, not [only] because the water is deep but [also] because it is rapid.