Despite numerous attempts at reform over the past decade and a half, the Jordanian government has failed to permanently adopt a new personal status law (PSL). One of the most controversial issues standing in the way of reform is women’s right to divorce. In 2001, Jordan introduced a new PSL that included the khulʿ clause, which gave women the right to dissolve a marriage by waiving their marital rights and offering financial compensation to the husband. Under the modified law, the judge could grant a divorce, even if the husband did not agree—a law that broke from the traditional legal application of khulʿ. After the lower house of parliament rejected the law, Jordan revised its PSL again in 2010 by returning to a more sharīʿa-based definition of khulʿ while at the same time guaranteeing women access to divorce through other sharīʿa-sanctioned means. Despite this, the law did not pass and remains a temporary law. This paper explores the reasons for Jordan's failure to enact a permanent, more progressive divorce law for women, as well as the contours of the debate over reform. PSL reform represents a departure from cultural and religious tradition and thus has become an arena for contestation over competing notions of cultural authenticity. The case of khulʿ in Jordan highlights tensions that exist regarding such competing claims of cultural authenticity, questions of religious and political legitimacy, and the authority of the state. I examine the ways in which the various actors involved in reform—the monarchy, women’s rights activists, Islamists, parliamentary representatives, international organizations, and the justice system—respond to and negotiate with one another on issues pertaining to women’s rights and the family. Focusing specifically on the issue of divorce for women and taking a closer look at how PSL reform in Jordan has been facilitated or obstructed at different times by the actors involved demonstrates how and why the interaction of these groups and their competing claims of cultural authenticity ultimately result in decreased gender justice for women in the law.