Passing multiple error classes to ruby's rescue clause in a DRY fashion

You can use an array with the splat operator *.

EXCEPTIONS = [FooException, BarException]

begin
  a = rand
  if a > 0.5
    raise FooException
  else
    raise BarException
  end
rescue *EXCEPTIONS
  puts "rescued!"
end

If you are going to use a constant for the array as above (with EXCEPTIONS), note that you cannot define it within a definition, and also if you define it in some other class, you have to refer to it with its namespace. Actually, it does not have to be a constant.

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Splat Operator

The splat operator * "unpacks" an array in its position so that

rescue *EXCEPTIONS

means the same as

rescue FooException, BarException

You can also use it within an array literal as

[BazException, *EXCEPTIONS, BangExcepion]

which is the same as

[BazException, FooException, BarException, BangExcepion]

or in an argument position

method(BazException, *EXCEPTIONS, BangExcepion)

which means

method(BazException, FooException, BarException, BangExcepion)

[] expands to vacuity:

[a, *[], b] # => [a, b]

One difference between ruby 1.8 and ruby 1.9 is with nil.

[a, *nil, b] # => [a, b]       (ruby 1.9)
[a, *nil, b] # => [a, nil, b]  (ruby 1.8)

Be careful with objects on which to_a is defined, as to_a will be applied in such cases:

[a, *{k: :v}, b] # => [a, [:k, :v], b]

With other types of objects, it returns itself.

[1, *2, 3] # => [1, 2, 3]

While the answer given by @sawa is technically right, I think it misuses Ruby's exception handling mechanism.

As the comment by Peter Ehrlich suggests (by pointing to an old blog post by Mike Ferrier), Ruby is already equipped with a DRY exception handler mechanism:

puts 'starting up'
begin
  case rand(3)
  when 0
    ([] + '')
  when 1
    (foo)
  when 2
    (3 / 0)
  end
rescue TypeError, NameError => e
  puts "oops: #{e.message}"
rescue Exception => e
  puts "ouch, #{e}"
end
puts 'done'

By using this technique, we can access the exception object, which usually has some valuable information in it.