From the Beryllium article in Wikipedia:
Beryllium dissolves readily in non-oxidizing acids, such as $\ce{HCl}$ and diluted $\ce{H2SO4}$, but not in nitric acid or water as this forms the oxide.
I think it would be helpful to have a definition of 'non-oxidizing acid'. Is it an established term in chemistry? Am I right to understand that it is an acid that can only act through its $\ce{H+}$ moiety, and not by the reduction of its conjugate base part (as in the reaction between $\ce{HNO3}$ and $\ce{Cu}$)?
There's a little obscure page titled oxidizing acid on Wikipedia.
The trouble is, until I came across this term, I imagined all acids to be oxidizing by definition. It's not very intuitive.
P.S.