Two-Thousand Year Old Research?

So. I'm not going to lie. Research papers sound imposing. Given the minimum of 2500 words and consisting of a full 30% of my entire grade in this course, they can be a little disconcerting. If you take procrastination into account, they become very disconcerting. Fortunately for me, these blog posts have set deadlines every week, so emptying my thoughts here over time will help me when it comes to actually formulating the body of my paper.

So about my topic. Originally I planned to write on the gross atrocities behind the War in Iraq and its effect on the United States, but since this topic is such a "hot potato" in politics today I have decided to side-step it and research something a little more "cut and dry". That something will be the story behind the rise of Christianity and its slow polarization away from what is called Judaism in the first centuries after Jesus Christ walked the earth. 

As discussed in earlier posts, I have a unique background with regards to the Abrahamic faiths. I enjoy researching them and learning the history behind what we see with regards to these religions in society today. Why are the Jews and the Christians enemies? Why is there such a rift between these two groups of people? How can they claim to base their knowledge off of the same Scriptures yet have such differing views on how to be right with God? Where does Jesus of Nazareth fit in? These questions and more I will attempt to answer in my study. 

I plan to rely heavily upon the early church writings and the works of some famous historians from the time period. I will concentrate on Constantine, the early fourth century Roman emperor who legalized Christianity throughout the empire, and the integral part he played in causing the church to behave much like what we see in western Christianity today. Depending upon the amount of effort this will require and how much space I have when I begin putting everything together, I may even look into the effect of Martin Luther on the church and the rise of Protestantism in western Europe in the early sixteenth century.
Since I am very interested in this topic and have somewhat of a personal stake in the issue, I believe I will not dread this assignment as much, say, as researching the mutation of lipoproteins over time and their current position in biochemistry. (Who's ever even heard of lipoproteins? Kudos to all you biochemists out there. God be with you.)
Anyway, I'm actually sort of looking forward to putting all of this information together. Since I have been researching this topic on my own for quite some time, I hope to not have too much difficulty finding reliable sources of information. I expect to learn much from this study and help my readers better understand the reasons the Jews and Christians behave the way they do with regards to one another in the 21st century.