What is the intellectual position you take in your paper called?

The thesis is your particular perspective or position to give solution to a research question.  

As a writer you must support your thesis with arguments or ideas that clarify your point of view and you need to summarize a lot of complex information to produce a better understanding of the research problem.

the answer should be:

the intervention of the supernatural gives gilgamesh hope that he will defeat humbaba.

the answer is "began" because it is a action that can be done