Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik was a fox and not a hedgehog according to his son-in-law Rabbi Aharon Lichtenstein. Fox-like in his varied approach to challenges, unlike a hedgehog with only has one solution to everything. While Rabbi Lichtenstein was also a fox, most of their student are hedgehogs.
Rabbi Lichtenstein was referring to Isaiah Berlin’s application of, “"a fox knows many things, but a hedgehog one important thing," (attributed to the Greek poet Archilochus). The idea being that there are two types of thinkers, hedgehogs who see the world through one lens, with the classic example being Hegel (or Marx) and foxes who respond differently to every situation with the most famous examples being William Shakespeare or the French essayist, Michel de Montaigne.
The Rav was not predicable because he was not a hedgehog. He was not just a liberal, or a frumy, 100% Modern Orthodox!, yeshivsh, etc. He contained multitudes. Rav Lichtenstein was perhaps more of a hedgehog on some things (politics comes to mind) than his father-in-law, but he was still clearly his own man, in a way unique to gadola yisrael.
It seems obvious that many of their students and their students students are quite predicable. We know what they will say on the issue before they do. It isn’t that there is something lacking in them. Rather they are hedgehogs, seeing the world through the prism of overarching ideas. Often through the overarching ideas of the fox-like thinkers who taught them. Somewhat ironic, but also somewhat sweet. And not a surprise.
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