During Emperor Zhongzong's Second Reign
In 705, Wu Zetian was overthrown in a coup, and Li Xian was restored to the throne (as Emperor Zhongzong). On account of Zhu Qinming's service to him, he promoted Zhu to be Guozi Jijiu (國子祭酒), the principal of the imperial university, and further gave him the designation Tong Zhongshu Menxia Sanpin (同中書門下三品), making him a chancellor de facto. He was soon made the minister of justice (刑部尚書, Xingbu Shangshu) and then the minister of rites (禮部尚書, Libu Shangshu). He was also created the Duke of Lu and given the honorific title of Yinqing Guanglu Daiful (銀青光祿大夫). The coup leaders Huan Yanfan, Cui Xuanwei, Yuan Shuji, and Jing Hui, themselves now powerful chancellors (although they would soon lose power due to the machinations of Emperor Zhongzong's powerful wife Empress Wei and her lover and Emperor Zhongzong's trusted cousin Wu Sansi), became his students in studying the Rites of Zhou, and Zhu was well respected. He was put in charge of editing the imperial history. However, in 706, he would have a brief downfall -- as he was indicted by the censor Xiao Zhizhong of having hidden a parent's death to avoid serving a mourning period, a severe breach of the Confucian requirements for filial piety -- and was demoted to be the prefect of Shen Prefecture (申州, roughly modern Xinyang, Henan).
Zhu, worried that he would never again be returned to power, took to flattering Empress Wei, and was soon recalled to again be the principal of the imperial university. In 709, when Emperor Zhongzong was set to sacrifice to heaven and earth south of Chang'an, Zhu and his deputy, Guo Shanyun (郭山惲), in order to flatter Empress Wei, took an interpretation of the Rites of Zhou to mean that Empress Wei should serve as the second stage sacrificer. Emperor Zhongzong initially doubted this interpretation and requested further opinions from scholars. Two scholars from the ministry of ceremonies, Tang Shao (唐紹) and Jiang Qinxu (蔣欽緒), as well as another deputy of Zhu's, Chu Wuliang (褚無量), spoke against this interpretation and argued that such interpretation would only be reasonable in sacrifices to the imperial ancestors. Emperor Zhongzong had the chancellor Wei Juyuan rule on this matter, and Wei Juyuan ruled for Zhu's proposal, thus allowing Empress Wei to serve as the second stage sacrificer. However, with Tang's and Jiang's objection, he rejected a further proposal of Zhu's that Emperor Zhongzong's powerful daughter Li Guo'er the Princess Anle serve as third stage sacrificer, instead making Wei Juyuan the third stage sacrificer. During a feast in 710 after one of Empress Wei's relatives was married, Zhu volunteered to perform a dance known as Bafeng Wu (八風舞) -- during which he shook his obese body, his head, and rolled his eyes around, drawing laughter from Emperor Zhongzong but secret disgust from other officials.
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