In Greek, why is the definite article never in vocative case?
Grammar is descriptive not prescriptive, so the question is a bit ill-formed. Can you think of a hypothetical situation where you would use the vocative and a definite pronoun would be meaningful?
Bible Search in Greek NT for:
morph.g:DV
found 26 verses where the Definite article is Vocative.
Keep Smiling [:)]
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The pronoun αὐτός, -ή, -ό is declined like a regular 1st and 2nd declension adjective, except that the nom. and acc. neuter sing. end in -ο, not -ον (like the definite article). There is no vocative case.
Cynthia W. Shelmerdine, Introduction to Greek, Second Edition (Newburyport, MA: Focus Publishing; R. Pullins Company, 2008), 46.
4.3 The Article.
In Greek the definite article is declined as is the noun, but there is no indefinite article corresponding to English a or an. To express the indefinite idea in Greek, the article is simply omitted; thus, ὁ λόγος = “the word,” but λόγος = “word” or “a word.” Later it will be observed that under certain circumstances a noun which does not have the Greek article can be translated as if it does. Usually, however, if the article is not present, the word should be translated as indefinite.The following chart shows the declension of the definite article for masculine and neuter words. You must master these forms, since they provide the building blocks for many aspects of the Greek language. The masculine forms are used with all masculine nouns, and the neuter forms with all neuter nouns, regardless of the declension. Note that the definite article is not used with the vocative case.
Ray Summers and Thomas Sawyer, Essentials of New Testament Greek, Rev. ed. (Nashville, TN: Broadman & Holman, 1995), 16.
short answer is the vocative IS definite. If I call you "Christian" you and I both know which specific Christian I am calling (vocative). I don't need to add "the" for anyone to know I am definitely referring to a particular Christian.
Bible Search in Greek NT for: morph.g:DV found 26 verses where the Definite article is Vocative.
Bible Search can be expanded to show Definite article Vocative (albeit definite article does not have vocative spelling) before Noun Vocative:
(morph.g:DV BEFORE 2 WORDS morph.g:NV) OR morph.g:DV
Mounce provides a detailed discussion of the form of the vocative case as it appears in the NT in his Morphology of Biblical Greek [[Page 167 >> https://ref.ly/res/LLS:MORPHBBCLGRK/2013-08-15T17:13:40Z/449339?len=1387]]
If one was really interested in looking further, the Greek Grammar Ontology has sections on the article and the vocative case.
