The sages were divided about a historical question: did the Flood which the Torah tells us of also engulf the Land of Israel? One sage, Resh Lakish, thought that it did engulf the Land of Israel. Another sage, Rabbi Yochanan, thought that it did not engulf the Land of Israel. Each of these sages tried to bring proof for his words and to contradict the words of his colleague.
The re’em is a large animal, and due to its size it could not have fit into Noah’s ark. So how, the sages asked, did it survive the Flood? If we suppose that the Flood indeed did not engulf the Land of Israel, we can well understand how it survived; it spend the time of the Flood in the Land of Israel. But how, in the opinion of the sage who thought the Flood also engulfed the Land of Israel, did the re’em survive the Flood? Another sage answered: Noah put it in the ark when it was young, on the day of its birth. The scholars asked: one of the sage, Rabba the son of Bar Chana, testified that even the infant re’em is exceptionally large: “I have seen,” said this sage, “A day old re’em as high as Mount Tabor — the length of its neck was 3 parsaot. It cast a ball of excrement and blocked up the Jordan.” If so, it is still unclear how the re’em survived the Flood. Answer: Noah put only the animal’s head in the ark. The scholars went on to ask: But the re’em head alone is a whole kilometer wide, so even his head would not be able to enter. A different scholar said that Noah put the only the nose of the re’em inside the ark. The scholars continued to question. Didn’t the ark sway from the force of the waves of water, so the nose of the re’em would be thrown out of the ark? Answer: Noah tied its horns to the ark. They went on to ask: according to the sage Rav Chisda, the flood waters were boiling hot. If so, the re’em, whose nose was in the ark and whose body was outside it, should have been burned by the boiling water and died. If so, we are again left with the question of how the re’em survived the flood waters according to the sage who thought the Flood also engulfed the Land of Israel.
Answer: You are forced to conclude, the scholars argue, that there was a miracle and the waters surrounding the ark were temperate. This is how the re’em survived the Flood; his nose was inside the ark, his horns were tied to the outside, and there were temperate waters around him.
Proof that temperate waters surrounded the ark is that if we suppose the waters around the ark were boiling hot, how did the tar which protected the ark from leakage not melt? You are forced to conclude that it was a miracle.
(Babylonian Talmud, Tractate Zevachim 113b)