If a tree falls in the forest and no one is there, does it make a sound? If an implied author transmits echoes of Scripture for the benefit of an implied audience, do those echoes ever reach the ears of real audiences? If so, how do those real audiences respond? Do they disregard the noise? Do they stop up their ears? Do they listen attentively?

So far, our discussion of the Fourth Gospel's allusions to marriage texts has ignored real authors and audiences. It has stayed within parameters established by the Gospel itself. Text-related criteria such as availability, correspondence, rhetorical emphasis, recurrence, and thematic coherence have been used to show how the Gospel's implied author alludes to Jer. 33:10–11, Gen. 29:1–20, Song 1:12, and Song 3:1–4. The implied author's overriding concern with Jesus' messianic identity suggests that he and his audience attribute messianic significance to these passages. The fact that they can be interpreted as messianic prophecies in light of Ps. 45 lends strong support to this notion. There is also some indication that, for the implied author and audience, the Samaritan woman and Mary Magdalene – and perhaps the anonymous bride of John 3:29 – exemplify believers in some way. The Gospel text yields enough evidence to identify the allusions, to interpret them, and to explain their presence.

Nevertheless, one wonders how they might have been produced and perceived by real people. Might the person or persons who composed the Fourth Gospel have intended these allusions?