This tradition denies the need for residency as a prerequisite for joining the tribe. In this case, the non-Maasai member must also go through the necessary age-specific rites of passage that members of the tribe must endure: “The Masai have for several generations recruited and accepted non-Masai into their communities » (Gulliver, 1969, p. 237). The Masai managed to do this in order to obtain the strongest and most able-bodied individuals who could take charge of the shepherd and protect the tribe from threats from other tribes. It is therefore not necessary to have a tribal origin in the community, which has made the Maasai a powerful and adaptable group in sub-Saharan Africa. These are important aspects of the non-residential policy of allowing non-Maasai into the community within non-kinship traditions that define the age and skills of the individual recruited from the male population ( Kressel 12). In this type of African society, the openness of tribal membership allows the Masai tribe to be more flexible in the new recruits they bring into the society.