depending on your paladin's spec, he was either a simple ninja, or "half right", but didn't think his decision to roll all the way through when he saw epic and went into what I like to call a "purple haze"
if he was holy or retribution, he's either just ninjaing or he's woefully stupid. cuz there is absolutely no valid use either spec would have for this that constitutes "need", it might slightly help him with an offset of gear for grinding if he's holy, but that's it.
if he's protection, that's another matter. I have a 70 protection paladin myself, and I can tell you, virtually 100% of competant paladin tanks do their tanking with a spell damage caster weapon. if your group would like to enjoy the AOE tanking goodness that is a pally holding 7 elites at once, he's gonna need to pump up that spell damage for nice juicy holy shield blocks and consecration ticks. so for the spell damage, especially if his was very low and he did not have any caster weapon, he might legitimately believe this to be a good tanking weapon for him. that said, he obviously did not think his roll all the way through, as this thing has no stats, notably no stamina, and the proc is useless to him, as all the spells a paladin uses to tank are instant, making this weapon enormously inferior for him to 70 blues such as the continuum blade, crystalforged sword, or mana wrath, or the honor hold/thrallmar epic caster swords. were it me, I'd not roll need on this over a DPS caster who needed it, but depending on his gear, it might not really qualify as ninjaing.